Birthright
by The Rains of Castamere
Summary: With help of his secret apprentice, Shira Brie, countless agents, Imperial generals and governors, Darth Vader plots to overthrow Palpatine and declare himself Emperor. ANH-era AU. Features Ahsoka, Luke & Leia, Han Solo and many other characters. R/R!
1. twenty years earlier

**A/N**: This story takes place in the same AU as my other story, "Bereaved." Check that out if you want to learn more about this AU!

* * *

><p><em>Elevation.<em>

_Anakin Skywalker couldn't stand any more of it. He was climbing into skies of Coruscant, each passing floor of the Jedi Temple denoted by a gentle _whoomp_ of air being displaced in the lift shaft. The endless city expanded before him, in all directions, yet all he could think of were mountains of Telredar. Those narrow, defined spires that protruded like spines on an armored rodents back, each one creating so many valleys and cliff sides and crevices-each one a potential bastion for the entrenched resistance to hide._

_There were no bright blazes of warfare on Telredar. No singular engagements hot and sustained enough to truly be called battles. No grand deployments where troops could be counted in the thousands...where commands could be easily organized and circumscribed in battalions and troops and regiments. There was little machinery, crude equipment, ancient artillery. And even fewer droids._

_It was the shape of things to come: an image of what happens when both sides of a conflict exhaust their resources but not their resolve. Battle and warfare degraded to attrition and horror._

_Anakin and his Padawan had to stand before the Council, to answer their little questions about his experience in what could only be described as the newest chapter of this Clone War. What began as a civil war with clearly defined sides (the Clones and the Republic over here, the Droids and the Confederates over there) was becoming an all-out free-for-all. War had ravaged and destroyed so much of the Galaxy's basic infrastructure that chaos and anarchy were quickly becoming the new standard all over the rim worlds._

_Ordinary citizens were beginning to take up arms and push out onto the streets. Civil unrest was spreading from planet to planet like a plague. The civilian populations of planets officially sworn to the Republic were taking up arms and screaming for the downfall of the Senate and its Supreme Chancellor. The only semblance of order that could still be pushed upon these crumbling worlds was by the might of the Grand Army of the Republic and its Jedi Commanders._

_...but was crowd control even a Jedi's job?_

_Anakin gritted his teeth as he looked past his own reflection in the glass. How could he possibly know? He only took the orders and the mandates of the Supreme Chancellor and did his best to see them done. This _inquiry_ by the Jedi Council was a waste of time. How could they drag him in here when hundreds of other worlds were still burning in revolt? This was the age of treason and anarchy. If they wanted there to be any shred of the Republic left by this time next year, they would have simply patted him and Ahsoka on the back for a job well done and sent them on to the next world that needed to be pacified._

_Instead, they had called this official inquiry for the purpose of...what? Reviewing the rules of engagement? Telredar was an abattoir. It was horrible. Atrocities committed on both sides, by the Republicans loyal to Palpatine and the Senate and by the revolutionaries calling for independence. Lines were crossed-and they had to be! a war was being waged!-and yes, Anakin and Ahsoka were at the center of it but now was not the time to pontificate over how "necessary" it truly was. Results were produced. Shouldn't that have been enough?_

_The council was too fickle with their rules and codes. Sometimes he wondered if how they could have ever won battles with such a narrow outlook. Then he remembered: with Ahsoka at his side, he had posted more victories than any member of that blasted Jedi Council._

_Anakin looked at his Padawan. Telredar had challenged her, more than any other deployment had in the past. He could still see it in her eyes, the burden carried upon her shoulders. Lines were blurred and crossed and redefined. Innocents were slaughtered-and not always by the Rebel bad guys, but sometimes by the Republican irregulars, the Telredari that were supposed to be their allies._

"_Don't worry, Ahsoka," Anakin said, "it'll go fine."_

_She bit her lip. "What if they go through with it?"_

"_And break us up?"_

_Ahsoka nodded gravely and he recalled the last time the council had reprimanded them, for the incident on Ulhezar, and the way Mace Windu had threatened to take apart their two-man team._

"_They won't, Ahsoka." He raked back several strands of his sandy blond hair. "They don't have the nerve. Besides, the only way it could come to that is if this inquiry goes bad. It won't."_

"_Telredar was pretty messed up." Her voice faltered, strained by a haze of fear and doubt. "Anakin, what we did. All those people-I still don't feel right about it."_

_His eyes narrowed. "We did what was necessary to fulfil the mandate," he said. "We saved Senator Amidala's life-"_

"_But that council always wants more than results." She closed her eyes and rubbed the heel of her palm against one of her montrals. "I don't want them to separate us."_

_He looked at her glumly, recognizing the tangle of confused, conflicting feelings that emanated from his Padawan learner. Their affection for each other ran deep, but she was attracted to him in a manner that he couldn't think of as entirely...appropriate. _

_But he couldn't hold that against her. Could he? After all, she was a teenager, with all the hormones...that wasn't unusual. But he had done nothing to discourage or even address those confused feelings. He pushed it to the back of his mind, somehow hoping that she would grow out of it eventually, or perhaps meet someone closer to her own age to direct those feelings towards. But somewhere in the process, he had all but forgotten that his "young" apprentice was six years his junior. _

_Anakin swallowed hard, biting his lip while trying to not let her see. He was only five years younger than Padmé. Was this how she felt when he first approached her, all those years ago?_

"_I don't either, snips," he said. "Hey," he said, placing a hand on her shoulder as he recognized her downtrodden expression. "They're not going to split us up, alright? We're just too damn effective together. We carry the whole army on our back, how can they disagree with that?"_

_She pursed her lips. "I think the clones would protest."_

"_Kriffin' right they would," Anakin said with a chuckle. _

_A silence feel upon them, punctured only by the gentle _whoosh_ of passing floors._

"_Even if they do," Anakin said, "it's not like it would be the end of us. We'll always be friends."_

_The shadow of a smile appeared on her face. "Yeah."_

"_No-more than friends." He clasped her hand, which was as calloused from the saber as his. "We're like family, Ahsoka. You're the sister I never had. You can count on me. I'll always be there for you."_

_That shadow became a full smile, though it only seemed like a facade, hiding from him the well of sadness and disappointment below. "And I will always be there for you, Master."_

_His brows shot up. "Always?"_

"_Always," she said. "I promise."_

"_As do I," he said, smiling as the lift came to a halt and the lift door slid open._

_One person stood alone in the antechamber, her red catsuit glowed brightly in the waning Coruscant sun. As always, she stood out from the tan and brown robes all the other Jedi of the Order wore. Anakin recognized her, if not for her alternative dress, then for her cropped blond hair and her bright eyes, which middled between light green and vibrant blue._

"_Master Siri?" He said, approaching her with a smile. "How are you? I haven't seen you since Ando Prime."_

_She looked up from her tablet and greeted him with an equally cordial smile. "I'm well, Anakin, how are you? I take it this is your Padawan?"_

"_Ahsoka Tano," she said with a curt bow. "Pleased to meet you, Master Siri..."_

"_Tachi," Siri completed._

"_What are you reading, Master?" Anakin asked with a slight nod to her datapad._

_Siri tilted the screen to allow the both a glance._

_"Theories and Musings on the Nature of the Living Force" by Qui-Gon Jinn._

_"Oh," Anakin said, muted expression on his face._

_"You've read it?" Siri asked._

"_I have!" Ahsoka volunteered, ever eager to show up her master, even before one of _his_ elders. "It's one of his better, more complete works."_

"_I...well, not exactly." Anakin said, hints of embarrassment in his tone, "Obi-Wan's showed me a few excerpts, though."_

_"Well," Siri said, voice flush with mock indignance, "it's not exactly _Popular Droid Mechanics_, so I...understand."_

_"Or _Podracing Weekly_," Anakin replied pointedly. "There's more to me than you think, Master Siri."_

_"I'm sure there is," Siri said flatly. Ahsoka suppressed a laugh. "But you should probably get in there before Mace decides to punish you for your tardiness."_

"_What about you?" Anakin frowned. "I mean, you got here before us, but they've got you just waiting outside...?"_

_Siri shrugged. "The council's supposed to assign me a new Padawan, but they're not here yet, so I'm waiting."_

"_Yikes," Ahsoka said. "Negative points for punctuality, prospective student..."_

_Siri tilted her head. "I know, right? I don't even want a new apprentice. But Obi-Wan keeps prodding me, forcing the damn thing down my throat..."_

_Anakin had to stifle the urge to smirk. A swarm of rumors always seemed to surround Obi-Wan and Siri, and he had always wondered if there was any shred of truth to it, if it was at all possible. Did she have had an affair with Obi-Wan? Then he shook his head and consigned the silly rumor to the corner of his mind where it belonged._

"_Anyways," Siri said, lifting up her tablet once more. "You should go on. See you around."_

_Anakin and Ahsoka both gave a curt bow as they walked to the door to the main chamber. The doors slid open, exposing the inner sanctum and a dozen Jedi Elders, none of whom appeared particularly pleased. Anakin shot his apprentice a re-affirming look then paced on, leading the way as he should._

"_Greetings, Master Skywalker, Padawan Tano," Mace Windu said as the doors to the ante chamber slid closed behind them._

"_I'm sure you know why you've been summoned?" Ki-Adi-Mundi said._

"_Speak with you on the incident at Telredar, we must," Yoda said._

_Anakin swallowed hard, mentally preparing himself for the barrage of questions they likely had. "The fighting on Telredar was the most difficult I've encountered in all the war. You can't blame us for the way things turned out-"_

"_You don't have to explain yourself," Obi-Wan said. "We have no questions."_

_Anakin frowned, then looked about the council chamber, searching for an answer in any of the councilors' stoic eyes._

"_We've learned all we needed to know from the testimony of others there, from the battle reports filed." Mace Windu's voice could not have been sterner._

"_Summoned you we have," Yoda began, hands folded over the gnarled head of his cane, "to pass the judgment of this council."_

_Anakin's posture straightened. Ahsoka huddled even closer to him, practically hiding behind his shoulder so as to use his body as a shield from Mace and Obi-Wan's piercing stares._

"_Anakin Skywalker," Mace began, "it is the judgment of this council that you are unfit for the rank of Jedi Master."_

_The words sucked the air from his lungs, yet he still found the breath necessary to shriek out in shock. "What?"_

_Ki-Adi-Mundi continued where Mace left off: "Your flagrant disregard of our laws and codes, of the practices accepted as standard by the elders of this order since time immemorial have proven this much to us: while it is acceptable that you put yourself in danger for the sake of furthering goals and accomplishing your missions, so long as you hold that rank, you also endanger all the younger Jedi that seek to follow your example."_

"_No," Anakin whispered, shaking his head in fear of the judgment that would follow._

"_As such," Mace said, "we have seen fit not only to strip you of your title-"_

"_No!" Ahsoka shrieked, stepping in front of her master before he could mouth his protestation. "You can't punish him! It's my fault."_

_Ki and Mace both paused, the latter leaning back in his chair as while steepling his fingertips._

"_I..." Ahsoka sucked in a weary breath. "I tortured those men, and ordered the clones to pillage those towns-"_

"_Order this, only upon your master's advice, you did," Yoda said pointedly, a single green digit pointed at the young padawan. "Pernicious and crude, these methods are."_

"_But we got results!" Anakin hissed. He felt the veins in his neck bulging and pounding, racing with the rhythm of his staccato heartbeat. "We saved Senator Amidala's life!"_

"_Justify the ends the means do not!" Yoda snapped. "Know this well, you should, young Skywalker!"_

_Anakin shook his head, pure rage fomenting in his heart, so bright and fierce that it rivaled the blinding glare of Tatooine's twin suns. "We did what we had to."_

_Mace leaned forward again, his unwavering glare fixated on Anakin. "And it is precisely because of that mindset that we can no longer accept you as a teacher in our order."_

_His eyes widened, knowing the next words that were coming, feeling them like the headlights of a cargo lifter, about to broadside his speeder._

"_It is our judgment that you are no longer fit to instruct a Padawan learner."_

"_No!" Ahsoka reacted as if struck, falling back into Anakin, who draped his arms over her shoulders protectively._

"_You can't do this!" Anakin yelled, the full range of his anger booming through his powerful voice. "She is my apprentice! You can't take her."_

"_Calm down, Skywalker." Mace's tone and composure were the absolute antithesis to Anakin's shrieking agitation._

_He shook his head, turning from Mace's disapproving glare to Obi-Wan's stolid, unreadable gaze. "You can't-"_

"_The council's decision is unanimous, Anakin," Obi-Wan said._

_The sheer finality of the statement momentarily crushed his resolve, as did the betrayal, the underhanded stab from behind. Obi-Wan had voted against him, had put him down in front of the Council-_

_He looked up at Obi-Wan, wrath renewed by the familiarity of the man and memories of all his past grievances and disagreements. His hand-the real one, made of flesh, bone and blood-balled into a fist, the knuckles white with anger at his mentor._

"_This is an outrage," Anakin bellowed. "It's unfair. I have done nothing but my duty, fulfilled mandate after mandate, won battle after battle and this is how you choose to reward me?"_

"_You are out of order." Obi-Wan's voice, calm and collected, could still project over Anakin's enraged tone._

"_No, I'm not," he spat through clenched teeth. "Ahsoka Tano is _my_ padawan learner. You cannot take her from me-"_

"_You will accept this Council's judgment or you will be expelled," Mace said._

"_Master!" Ahsoka whispered before he could raise his voice to protest again. One of her orange hands wrapped around his balled fist, willing it to unfurl until she could interlace her fingers with his. _Please, _she mouthed, begging him to calm. And he did, knowing full well how much she hated it when he was taken by his anger._

"_Dismissed you are, Knight Skywalker."_

_He turned from Ahsoka and looked up, giving his former master a final glance before untangling his hand from Ahsoka's and turning to leave the chamber._

"_There'll be another time," he whispered to his apprentice on the way out._

_The door to the antechamber opened then closed behind him. He was once again faced with Siri Tachi, whose reaction to his anger was intrigued but muted. He glared at her and wondered if she'd lied to him earlier, if she actually knew her role in this debacle. She quietly followed him with her eyes as he stomped off into the elevator._


	2. Chapter I

Moff Gorran Lorsca's secretary sat behind a large silver desk, smacking her gums on a piece of bubble chew. Her legs swayed beneath the desk as she absently fiddled with her tablet, searching the holonet for any sort of entertainment that could hold her attention for more than a few minutes. Blonde hair, set into fancy curls, cascaded down her shoulders and framed a pretty if vapid face. Every once in a while, a call would come through on the comm, which she would absently answer:

"Hello, Moff Lorsca's office...Oh, okay. Let me check his schedule...Yeah, I'm not sure. I mean, I don't know." She'd twiddle with her hair, curling the locks around one or two fingers. "I'd have to check with him first. Call again later? Yeah, yeah, that'd be easiest."

In short, Moff Lorsca's secretary was a moron. Shira Brie, dressed in casual civilian clothes, sat in one of the gray waiting couches, analyzing every tendency with muted interest. After visiting two other Moffs earlier that day, she had determined that she could glean all that she needed to know about that Moff by carefully analyzing their secretary.

If the secretary was attentive and serious, focused like a laser when it came to getting the Moff's affairs in order, then that Moff was ambitious, seeking to improve his station and standing within the Imperial order. Older, frumpy secretaries seemed to be associated with Moffs that equaled or exceeded their age. Like their secretaries, these Moffs had one goal in mind: surviving their twilight. Lastly, there was the sort of Moff embodied by this twit.

Moffs with secretaries like this were likely charlatans and gluttons. Every Moff had an excessive amount of power and authority granted to them by their office. They had all the opportunities one would ever need to pursue wealth, women and fame. Yet that was not enough for them: they needed to turn even the official stationary of their position into toys for personal indulgence and ingratiation.

This secretary was a perfect example of that. Shira knew that this woman wasn't just working as Moff Lorsca's secretary. She was likely working here, in his office during the day, and working in his bedroom at night. It was disgusting. It was pathetic.

Tiring of waiting, Shira rose and approached the secretary. "How much longer did you say Moff Lorsca would be?"

"Uhm," she turned from her tablet, electrum earrings, which were clearly above and beyond her pay grade, shimmering in the light of her desk lamp. "Any minute now-he's just in an important meeting with his adjutant."

Shira's eyes narrowed as she heard the sound of bellowing laughter beyond the doors to Moff Lorsca's office. A cold whisper from the dark urged her to butcher the secretary, her boss and his adjutant. _Come on! it pleaded, it would be so easy! And so, so satisfying. Just grab the knife you keep in your boot. You know, the one that all the security checkpoints fail to find-_

Shira closed her eyes, then pressed her fingertips against her brow, pushing the more indulgent aspect of her personality below the surface. Playing messenger was something she willingly did for her master, but it was not something she enjoyed or found any kind of fulfillment in. Fortunately, once she was done making contact with the thirty or so Moffs that had declared loyalty to Darth Vader, she could get to the business of dealing with some fifty others that hadn't.

The doors to Lorsca's office opened and Lorsca, a tall but lithe and rather puny man emerged, sharing a laugh with a shorter, rotund man that was also in Imperial uniform. His adjutant, no doubt.

"Got to say, Gor, you're the best at greenputt," the adjutant said.

Lorsca chuckled. "I would do it all over again, if only to see the look on your father-in-law's face."

The secretary cleared her throat. "Gor-" She shook her head, correcting herself, "Moff Lorsca, sir, this woman is here to see you."

"Indira Vaerna, intel division," Shira said, offering a business card with a blue stormtrooper helmet stamped on one side.

Lorsca dismissed his adjutant and took the card gently, frowning as he stared at the symbol. "Exactly what branch are you with?"

Shira's eyes narrowed. The bastard knew exactly who she was with. She said, polite tone belying her annoyance, "the classified kind, sir."

"Very well," he said with a resigned sigh. "Come on in."

Shira entered the office and Lorsca closed the door behind them. She took a seat at one of the chairs set before Lorsca's elaborate crystal-and-glass desk. Shira couldn't help glaring at the desk as Lorsca took a seat behind it. Like the secretary, it was another petty indulgence.

"So, exactly what is this about?" Lorsca asked, leaning back in his chair.

"I think you know exactly what this is about, Moff."

He tilted his head in another effort to play stupid. At least the other Moffs she dealt with had the decency to not beat around the bush when dealing with someone that knew about their...dirty deeds.

"There was a scandal here, just a year or so ago, if you remember."

Lorsca straightened in his chair. "You're referring to the Grandiose Ghitu?"

Shira nodded.

"If you're some kind of mole from internal-trying to poke around for some last scraps on that case, then allow me to save a lot of your time." Lorsca folded his hands on his desk and leaned forward. "The vultures have picked every last piece of rotted flesh from that sorry little affair. That little Jedi Hunt was complete. Everyone-and I mean _everyone_-that had anything to do with those missing credits was put away. If you leave soon enough you might catch the next flight to Asteroid B5G.7, where they're spending the rest of their lives mining spice for trying to defraud the Emperor."

She snorted. "Of course. Everyone was caught-everyone except you, right?" A sly smile spread upon her lips. "Because you were warned, weren't you?"

He laughed, hand waving out, palm open in the most confident and dismissive of gestures. "Three investigators came in before you-they cleared me on all counts-"

"Of course they cleared you on all counts. My master saw to it, didn't he?"

Lorsca seemed to lose his confident swagger for the first time, and his eyes glinted as he looked her up and down once more, this time taking note of more than just her anatomy.

Shira produced a small data disc from her pocket, then manipulated it with her thin fingers until it projected a steady hologram streaming with numbers and readouts and financial data, accounts and money trails that all led back to the credits absconded from the Imperial Treasury. Lorsca's eyes went wide for a moment then he lunged, reaching over the span of his crystal desk to grab at the data disc. Shira reacted by simply tossing it in his face. It struck him between the eyes before clattering to the desk.

"Take it," Shira hissed. "You're a fool if you think that is the only copy. We may not have visited with you for some time but my master remembers you. And he remembers what he did for you. He warned you when that mole from Coruscant came to infect your inner circle, helped you outmaneuver him, use him to put the rest of your accomplices away and take their cut of your earnings. My master has made you richer than your wildest dreams."

Lorsca looked up at her balefully. "And now he's come back to collect?"

"In fealty, not in credits." She leaned forward. "I came here to remind you of that, in case these files need to somehow find their way back to the Supreme Inquisitor's office on Coruscant."

His eyes widened with fear. "No, that won't be necessary. You tell Lord Va-"

"Lord who?" Shira was burning holes through him with her dull green eyes. Already, she'd construed five ways of killing him where he sat-only two of which involved shattering the glass desk that sat between them. "I don't know who that is, but _my_ master made it very clear just who you are to take your cues from. General Veers' short list was very explicit-yet you chose to elevate your cousin to the rank of Star Marshall for the Ghitu Sector. Why is that Moff Lorsca?"

His mouth hung ajar for a moment as he tried to look for the words. "Family commitments-I had already promised-"

"Family? Family? And what does your family know about you? For example, does your wife know about the healthy little trollop you keep in your secretary's chair? Does your daughter know?" She balled her hand into a fist until the bones in her knuckles cracked. "Make no mistake, Lorsca, we know everything about you. And there are varying degrees of punishment we can inflict upon you until you cooperate. That superlaser to the Supreme Inquisitor's office is only one of them. And remember-you're not the only man that wants to be Moff of the Ghitu Sector."

Lorsca looked down glumly.

"Do we understand each other?" She asked. When he nodded she stood up, gave him a smug glance then marched out of the office, not bothering to close the door behind herself.

* * *

><p>Darth Vader sat in his quarters aboard the Death Star, trying to make sense of the day's events. It had been twenty years. <em>Twenty years<em>. Twenty years that didn't feel like twenty years. Time passed at such a strange rate since he'd sustained those injuries on Mustafar, since he became this black suit and its inbuilt breathing machine, since he ceased to age like normal men.

But it was about twenty years ago when Obi-Wan and Siri took his Padawan from him. Twenty years since they since they cut him to pieces, threw him into that fiery river on Mustafar and left him for dead. These were the people who had called him friend and brother and pupil while at the same time shivving him in the back. And now his vengeance upon them was complete.

He'd settled his debt with Siri several years ago, in a victory so satisfying that it could not even be described in words. He'd crushed their seed and their hopes-a repayment in full for their betrayal. They'd turned his wife against him and ruined his family. It was only fitting that he would ruin theirs. The fullness and sweetness of that victory eight years ago-or was it nine?-made this one pale by comparison.

Today had presented him with the ultimate victory over Obi-Wan Kenobi. Vader cut him down. Decapitated him with one overpowering strike. Watched the old man's head roll and body slump. Yet the finality of action, the end result of his wrath felt...empty. Because it all it gave to him was proof that Obi-Wan was now beyond his reach. A dead man can suffer no more.

But a man denied of the woman he loves, of his child, of his prized pupil... That man would suffer every waking moment.

And it was that thought that tarnished what should have otherwise been a perfect victory. Obi-Wan Kenobi was not alone on his little foray into the Death Star. There was a boy there with him, whose cunning and strength with the Force was self-evident. A boy whose clairvoyance allowed him to elude the garrison aboard the Death Star and rescue the Princess. A boy who screamed in anguish when Obi-Wan was cut down. A boy who must be Obi-Wan's new pupil.

The boy would be dealt with, one way or another. But the turbulence Vader had felt since meeting the boy hours ago-if that little face-off in the docking bay could really be considered a meeting-seemed to suggest that he'd stumbled upon someone of great power. His communes with the Dark Side suggested that the boy had great potential, that he might be a powerful ally, an asset for the plans that were to come to fruition soon.

Vader swiveled in the chair of his meditation chamber as a glowing panel alerted him to an incoming transmission, audio only. The signal was scrambled twice and mirrored over itself to produce the highest level of encryption known to modern transmission technology.

_"Master?"_ Shira Brie's voice crackled through as the signal connected. _"I have put Lorsca in his place."__  
><em>  
>"Well done, apprentice," Vader said with a nod. "If he causes difficulties again, devise a more...permanent solution."<p>

_"Men loyal to us have already been installed as his underlings and successors. Devising an _accident_ would not be difficult."_

Shira's voice was sincere but subdued. She had a tendency to speak in a permanent whisper, a result of the ten years she'd spent training as a spy and infiltrator. Vader had taken her on as his apprentice when she was eleven. She'd spent every waking moment since following his training regimen, studying Sith teaching or undertaking missions on his behalf.

"Are you still tracking that Jedi?" Vader asked.

_"I lost track of her after Toprawa. She managed to escape the relay station even though the rebels there were routed."_

"If you can get a trace on the Jedi again, do so," Vader said. "But follow her at a distance. Do not engage her under any circumstances."

Brie didn't know who this unnamed Jedi was, but Vader did. And he did not want his prized student to seek a foolish confrontation with Tano. Skywalker's former Padawan was more than a match for her. Besides, Vader had no intention of going after Ahsoka-personally, through his agents or otherwise. Of all the people from his old life, she was the only one who had never fully betrayed him. That contented him enough to leave her in peace-provided she stayed out of his way.

_"Of course, Master," _Brie said. _"She's been too good a source of information to spring on now. If it wasn't for her, we never would have learned of the stolen Death Star plans."_

Vader grimaced beneath his mask. If only that information had not gotten out. The Death Star is a powerful weapon, but a weapon firmly in the hands of Tarkin-and, by proxy, Palpatine. It would have been better if the Rebels had gotten those plans unmolested and as many attempts as possible at destroying it, and huge segments of Emperor Palpatine's legitimacy with it.

Now, the chances of the Death Star being destroyed at the Rebel's hands seemed slim to none. And countering this superweapon when it came time for him to make his bid for the throne...would be difficult, to say the least. He would have to conceive of other ways of containing and limiting its power.

What he had learned from this, though, was that there was a leak high up in the Rebel hierarchy. He and Brie knew about Toprawa but they guarded that information. Someone else must have alerted Palpatine, leading to the raid on the relay station, the chase of Princess Leia and the Tantive IV to Tatooine, the return of Obi-Wan Kenobi from hiding and the emergence of Kenobi's powerful apprentice.

Vader looked up at the comm console and wondered for a moment if there was a hard limit on Brie's loyalty, which, thus far, seemed to be absolute and unwavering. He had rescued her from a squalid existence and given her a gift beyond the imagination of any street urchin from her sort of origins. That loyalty and her tolerance be stretched pretty far-but just how far before it broke?

Brie was powerful, but to take on the Emperor, Vader would need an even stronger apprentice at his side.

"There has been a disturbance in the Force, my apprentice," Vader said. "Have you felt it?"

_"Yes, Master, it was difficult to make out against the static of the destruction of Alderaan, but I felt it. Does it coincide with the emergence of this old Jedi? Kenobi?"_

"Partly. But there is another matter. Kenobi had an apprentice."

_"Apprentice?"_

"Yes," Vader said after a pause. "The Force is very strong with him. If manipulated properly, he could be an asset. If turned, he could be a powerful ally."

There was a pause as she took some time to digest fully what he had just told her. What could be going through her head at that moment? Fear? Anger at the prospect of being replaced? No, even with the countless stars and nebulae and light-years between them, Vader could sense the emotions within his Sith Apprentice and it was...subtler than that. A slight feeling of apprehension that was quickly rationalized away, judging from the sureness of her voice.

_"If he can help us destroy the Emperor, then he _must_ be turned."_

"Excellent." Vader pumped a mechanical fist. "If I do not find him on Yavin, then finding him will be one of your priorities."

_"As you will, my master."_

She closed the comm, then Vader leaned back in his chair. If Obi-Wan's apprentice could be found, then he might have a second apprentice. It would not be the first time. He'd raised Starkiller and Shira Brie at the same time, but they did not know about each other-they never did. This would be the first time he would have two apprentices that knew of each other's existences. And that presented new challenges-and new perils. Raising one Sith Apprentice was dangerous enough. But two? Two who might compete against each other-or, potentially, collaborate together...

No. Shira was his. He could control her. Her loyalty was absolute.

But if it wasn't? He would trade her up for a stronger apprentice. Palpatine had done so with Dooku so Vader would do the same here. After all, if there was one thing that Lord Vader had learned since his stumble on Mustafar, it was how to use his masters' tactics against them.

"The Death Star will enter the Yavin system in five minutes," the duty officer announced over the PA system.

Vader rose from his meditation chamber. Tarkin would want him on the observation deck.


	3. Chapter 2

The War Room on the Great Massassi Temple echoed with radio chatter. The brave souls that had mounted the Alliance's desperate attack on the Death Star screamed across the channels about fighters on their six or the arc of defensive turrets' fire. Once in a while, the room would take in a collective breath when someone announced the start of their attack run on the exhaust port.

Leia stood alongside General Dodonna and other members of the Alliance brass, her mind honed and focused to a diamond edge. She followed every utterance over the open comm, hoping, praying, and waiting for the pilots that would slay the Emperor's metal monstrosity. They were the last line of defense. If they failed, this base and the thousand souls that staffed it would be obliterated.

But she did not hope and pray and wait for the sake of extending her own life. She was not afraid of dying; she hadn't been in a long time. She came face-to-face with death daily-every time she reported for roll call in the Imperial Senate and swore the loyalty oath while looking into the Emperor's ocher eyes. She had faced death. She had escaped execution aboard the Death Star, rescued by that gallant farmboy and his vulgar, but charming, smuggler friend.

"The Death Star will be in range in five minutes," a robotic voice announced as another sliver of the elliptical that represented the orbit around the gas giant Yavin turned red.

Death was something she had long ago prepared herself for. Oblivion claims all, sooner or later. What Leia longed for was vindication. She wanted to be free of the guilt that wracked her since her detention aboard the Death Star...and the destruction of her homeworld.

The Princess' focus drifted away from the display and fell despondently upon the floor. She almost jumped, startled, as she felt a hand grasp her shoulder.

"Are you alright, Your Majesty?"

She blinked rapidly, unable to keep the gaze of the Togruta woman that had startled her. Leia suddenly frowned, realizing that she had no clue who that woman was. She looked up, meeting the Togruta's gaze, at once confused by the gut feeling that the woman was out of place here. Leia opened her mouth to query her name and rank, but a collective cheer drowned her out.

_"Bits away!"_

Anticipation set in as all eyes focused on the elliptical display.

_"Was that a hit?"_

_"Negative. It didn't go in. Just impacted on the surface."_

The shared anticipation quickly segued into a collective let down. Leia turned away from the display, again focusing on the Togruta.

"Do I know you?" Leia asked, straining to project her voice over the comm chatter.

"Not yet," she said. She then gestured to the display as Luke's outer-rim accent crossed over the chatter.

_"This is Red five, we're starting our attack run!" _

Luke's voice had brought Leia's full attention back to the display and the minutes stretched on as the chatter between Luke and his two wingmen continued to paint a bleak portrait. A group of TIEs chased them into the trench and shot down one of Luke's wingmen, then forced the other to pull up.

_"Artoo! See if you can-argh!"_

"Luke!" That was BASE 1. "Luke, are you alright?"

_"I'm hit, I'm hit, bad. I'm losing speed. Artoo-I need more power!"_

Another voice, one the Princess instantly recognized, streaked across the channel.

_"Yahoo!"_

The Generals and Commanders in the room all looked up at each other, save for the Togruta, whose focus never strayed from the table.

"Come on, Luke," the Togruta whispered, "use the Force!"

_"You're all clear, kid, now let's blow this thing and go home!"_

Leia's eyes sullenly drooped as she waited through that moment of radio silence.

"Was that a hit?" BASE 1 asked.

_"It...I-"_ There was a long pause, before that last word escaped him as the gravest of utterances: _"No."_

Leia closed her eyes as the defeat of the moment overwhelmed her. There was a silent pause, one that seemed to stretch on, moment after deafening moment, as radio techs and comm support staff one-by-one started to take off their headsets and look up at the tactical displays above, trying to discern from all that data where they could have gone wrong.

They didn't go wrong. No one had made a mistake. Everyone had performed their duty admirably...it's just...it was a long shot; highly unlikely they would succeed. They had established that in the pre-takeoff briefing. Still, acknowledging the possibility of failure then and facing it now...two entirely different things.

Members of the staff were rising from their seats now, turning to each other, shaking hands, slapping each other meaningfully on the arms, congratulating each other on a battle well fought, on lives well lived...acknowledging the beauty of the sentience they each saw in each other.

Leia swallowed hard at the scene, and then turned back to the comm when Han's voice once again crackled over the fray.

_"Come on, Luke, I got you covered."_

_"Han," _Luke said with a sigh,_ "just get out of here before they catch you with that tractor beam again."_

_"I'm not leaving here without you, kid."_

_"Look, my hyperdrive's offline, I've lost my starboard engines, I can barely keep this thing moving forward as it is. There's no helping me. Just get out of here, Han."_

General Dodonna put his hand on Leia's shoulder. "You have to go, Your Highness."

"We have transports?" She frowned. Why hadn't they started evacuating personnel earlier?

"No," he said. He gestured to the Togruta woman. "General Tano only has room for you in her transport."

She couldn't take her eyes off of General Dodonna, horrified at what was about to happen to him-at what was about to happen on this base. She looked around, feeling the heat of all the eyes focused on her. She was the only surviving member of the House of Organa; she was the only leader her orphaned people had left; she was one of the figureheads of the Alliance itself.

She had every reason to take this pass. But she was still ashamed of it. And she shook her head, protesting the special privilege granted to her position.

"No," She said forcefully.

"Your Majesty," General Tano interrupted with a soft and courteous tone.

Leia shook her head fervently. "General-" She shook her arm free of the Togruta's grasping hands. "I'm not going anywhere! Jan, I _won't_ leave you!"

Dodonna and Tano exchanged a look of some concern then Dodonna placed his hands on Leia's shoulders.

"You have to go," he said. "You're more important to the Alliance now than you ever have been in the past."

Leia shook her head frantically, tears filling her eyes as the harsh reality of the situation permeated every facet of her being. Shedidn't want-no, she couldn't stand-being _another_ survivor.

"Leia, _please_," Tano said urgently, "we have to go."

Leia closed her eyes. The tactical desk announced, "The Death Star will be in firing range in two minutes."

The Princess gave a resigned nod. Her heart ached as she turned to follow General Tano out.

"The Death Star will be in range in one minute."

Leia had a hard time keeping pace with Ahsoka. It was partly due to the General's superior athleticism, though Leia's linen gown also made running rather difficult. But Leia tried her best as they ran down the stairs, fleeing through the halls of the great temple and exiting through the large landing bays adjacent to the temple.

She took in the sight of hundreds-no, thousands-of Rebel troops in the landing bay. Some of them were standing, others merely sat, several cried. Yet all of them had eyes focused on the sky, gazes following the gray sphere that would be their doom.

She froze. She had prepared herself for her own death, but this was something she had never encountered. Even when she sat in the detention block of the Death Star, counting down the minutes to her execution, she felt comfort in knowing that the plans she had stolen could destroy the monstrosity. But there was nothing of that sort here. This devastating scene amounted to the eclipse of all hope. The collapse of both reason and faith in the face of armageddon.

If it wasn't for Tano's hard tug on her hand, she wouldn't have kept going.

* * *

><p>Darth Vader was spiraling through space, out of control.<p>

Through the transparisteel of his TIE/x1 cockpit, he could see the craft responsible for shooting down his wingmates. It was the battered old Corellian light freighter that Organa and Kenobi's companions had escaped on.

Vader's tapped several stabilizer controls and leveled out his craft. He tugged on his control stick and the craft banked slowly. The collision with his wingmate had done some damage but the x1 was still space worthy. As he came around, he saw that old Corellian light freighter slip away, jumping into hyperspace. And that last X-wing, the one piloted by that extremely powerful presence in the Force, came into view. He was limping toward a Yavin 5, the gas giant's _other_ jungle moon.

Vader toggled his controls and accelerated after the crippled X-wing. The cunning with which the pilot had flown, the way he was able to evade down the stretch of the Death Star trench, the turbulence Vader felt in the Force surrounding the craft seemed to telegraph to him just who the pilot was.

Obi-Wan's apprentice. It had to be. The boy was uncommonly gifted with the Force. Had Obi-Wan given him much training? Were the boy's abilities refined somewhat or was he doing all of this with pure talent?

For this boy to have survived Palpatine's genocide against the Force-Sensitive... Obi-Wan must have found him and hidden him away a long time ago. Unless he was born of a Jedi in hiding. No, that couldn't be. If Obi-Wan and Siri had had a child, Vader would have sensed it. He would have known.

He pushed on after Obi-Wan's apprentice for a while but quickly began to tire with the exercise. It would be more sensible to apprehend the boy with the Death Star's tractor beam and deal with him face-to-face, rather than attempt to shoot him down while piloting a damaged ship.

The Sith Lord depressed his comm. It didn't work. He tried the comm again, this time, designating his flagship, the ISD _Devastator_, as the recipient. Still, nothing but static.

A warning came to him from the Force. The Death Star was launching TIE fighters. Hundreds...No, thousands. Perhaps the battle station's entire complement.

But why-

For a moment, that energy field and its infinite mystery crystallized with revelation. The Death Star was jamming his transmissions. Those fighters were being sent out to destroy _his_ craft. He had been betrayed.

_Tarkin!_

A moment of rational thought pushed his initial anger down. No. Tarkin would not have done this. That gaunt old man was devious and cunning but _not_ stupid. He was not foolish enough to cross the Emperor. Not like this.

But if he followed that line of reasoning to its only logical end, then it meant...it meant that the only way he could be in this situation, with the entire complement of the Death Star turned against him, would be if the order had come from on high. From the Emperor.

Vader maxed out the twin ion engines and accelerated away from the Death Star, veering toward that same jungle moon the crippled X-wing fled toward. He tapped one of the side panels and ordered the navicomputer to start making the calculations for the jump into hyperspace.

It was too late. The first squadron of TIEs was already upon him. The x1 rocked under the pressure of blasterfire. Vader pulled every evasive maneuver he could, trying his best to stall while the navicomputer crunched away. But it was no use; the damaged x1 was too slow and there were more than a dozen fighters raining down on him.

The left wing seared off. The engines burned out. Yavin 5's gravity well caught the ship's momentum and dragged it closer. What remained of the x1 streaked into the jungle moon's atmosphere, disintegrating as the console short circuited and exploded with sparks.

The cockpit filled with flame and became a blistering coffin, reminiscent of his fiery birth on Mustafar.

Vader bristled with rage and steeped in outright hatred. Hatred for Motti. Hatred for Tarkin. Most of all, hatred for Palpatine.

In a final act of defiance, he reached out through to that psychic link he shared with his master, the bond that had been a source of nourishment and power for the past nineteen years, and violently severed it.

Then he reached out with the Force and tried to stabilize his descent.

* * *

><p>"The Death Star is clear to fire. The Death Star is clear to fire."<p>

The words droned on through Leia's mind as General Tano gestured to a G9 rigger, the last ship in the whole docking bay. Old and battered, it hardly looked space worthy, much less capable of escaping the blast radius of an exploding planet.

As soon as they were aboard, Tano slapped a button triggering the loading ramp to close and ran for the cockpit. The Princess stood by the threshold as the door slowly closed, balefully looking out to all the people they were about to leave behind.

This was her last image of Yavin 4: a young man, not more than fifteen or sixteen-well below the legal age of autonomy in most systems-standing purposefully alone. His dark hair was shaggy from months of neglect, unevenly styled by the combat helmet that he held in his hand. His fatigues were a size or so too big for his juvenile frame. He was gazing desolately, not at the sky or at the Death Star, but at the jungle world's huge trees, which even dwarfed the great temple itself.

Leia sighed heavily as she turned and leaned her back against the retracted ramp. She closed her eyes and massaged her temples. The whole ship jolted with movement, then with shifts of gravity as it accelerated rapidly into the atmosphere. The Princess paced to the bridge and took a seat in the co-pilot chair next to Tano, who was fighting vigorously with the controls. Seconds later, they were in the upper atmosphere and soon after that, in the blackness of space.

Through the window panes of the ship's cockpit, Leia could see the Death Star off in the distance and the jungle moon directly under them. There was a series of flashes from the Death Star's main dish; green tributaries merged into a stream of disruption, which the Princess followed from its point of origin to its impact on the planet below.

Leia got out of her seat. The moments after the superlaser's initial impact on the moon stretched on for what felt like hours. She pressed up against the window, peering down down so as to fill her view with Yavin 4 below. There was a sudden shake, a seismic tremor she could feel all the way out here in space, followed by an overwhelming sensation of dread.

Then the jungle moon exploded.

"Don't," Tano said, turning her focus away from the controls for the first time. "Don't look."

Leia didn't even acknowledge Tano; her eyes were glued to the flash beyond the window.

General Tano grabbed her by the arm and yanked her back down into her seat. "Don't," she said again, her voice a low growl, "you've already inhaled the death of one world. You don't need to breathe this poison."

But as soon as Tano turned back to the controls and continued drilling orders into the nav computer, Leia looked back at the cockpit's corner window. Without moving any further, she could see several fiery chunks of earth, streaking from the heart of the explosion. And Leia kept her gaze there, until the ship jumped to hyper and the scene of the massacre fazed into a blue blur.

As soon as they'd jumped to hyperspace, Leia felt a wave of nausea. The room started to spin in an uneven, gyrating motion. The only thing she could do to counteract the dizziness was close her eyes and rub at her temples to try and massage away the growing migraine. She heard the Ahsoka Tano grumble then slap her hand against her forehead. Leia opened her eyes briefly to face the General, whose distinctive white facial markings were tensed in a frown.

"See!" Ahsoka sighed. "I told you. But does anyone ever listen to me? _Noooo_."

Leia leaned back in her chair and groaned, closing her eyes and rubbing her face as the nausea gave way to drowsiness. The headache got worse, to the point where the sound of Ahsoka's light footfalls felt like Cyrillan cymbals being slammed in her head. A few seconds after leaving, Ahsoka returned, then gently lifted Leia's head and placed a pillow under it.

"As you are probably figuring out by now, major disturbances in the Force can be very, very bad for your health-or at least your peace of mind."

Leia groaned and tossed her head about on the pillow, opening her eyes for a few seconds to see the orange-skinned Togruta standing over her.

"What you just did would be akin to looking at the sun through a telescope. Terrible, terrible sensory overload." Leia felt some hands fall on her shoulders and gently hold her down. "Just relax. Rest for a couple minutes. It'll pass."


	4. days earlier, aboard the Death Star

_Gray._

_Gray walls, gray floors, gray doors and gray hallways filled with men wearing gray uniforms. Some of the older officers even had gray hair. Leia couldn't help but be annoyed by the constant repetition. She felt like she was viewing the world through a monochrome lens. Why did everything the Empire create have to be so drab and lifeless? _

_She shrugged to herself as a stormtrooper grabbed both of her hands by the bindings that secured them and pointed down the hall. This sort of culture-or rather, _lack_ of culture was one of the defining traits of the Empire. After all, something wouldn't _be_ Imperial if it wasn't boring, blasé and overtly utilitarian, now would it?_

_The stormtroopers practically dragged her across the hall. Her muscles were so weak from enduring Vader's interrogation that she could barely stand. They came to a door, which opened to...another gray atrium! Leia looked from the floor to the ceiling, wishing she could rip her eyes out at the torturous blandness of it all. If she could ascend to the office of Empress tomorrow, her first edict would involve paint buckets. Lots and lots of them._

_They started to drag her across the atrium and she laughed aloud to herself for obsessing over something so trivial. Her brain must have been malfunctioning as a result of all the damage Vader had done to it. She coughed as they stood her up before the next door. Her lungs still burned from Vader's attempts-could they be called 'attempts'? Leia was certain that if he really wanted to, he could have done the job entirely-at suffocating her._

_The door slid open, revealing an observation room with Darth Vader and two senior officers. One of the officers she couldn't recognize. The other, with his characteristic gaunt facial features and slicked back gray hair, was Wilhuff Tarkin. The sight of him made Leia stand on her own volition, no matter how difficult or painful. _

_"Governor Tarkin!" A vibrant, sarcastic smile appeared on her face as she straightened her posture. "I should expected to find you, holding Vader's leash. I recognized your foul stench when I was brought on board."_

_He chuckled lightly then curled his lips upwards in a vile smile. "Charming, to the last. You don't know how hard I found it, signing the order to terminate your life."_

_She jerked her head back, tugging away from the fingers he had placed on her chin. "I'm surprised you had the courage to take responsibility yourself."_

_"Princess Leia, before your execution, I would like you to be my guest, at a ceremony that will make this battle station operational. No star system will dare oppose the emperor now."_

_Leia's expression hardened as she stared at him pacing about the observation deck, oblivious to the hiss-click of Vader's respirator as the Sith._

_"The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers." _

_"In a way, you have determined the choice of the planet that will be destroyed first."_

_Leia was tired. So, so tired. She had just endured hours of torture at the hands of a Sith Lord-the same Sith Lord that now towered over her, the steady click of his respirator still ticking away at her tenuous grip over her sanity. What could Tarkin, this gaunt, frail-looking old man with a fake, overly-refined Coruscanti accent and these prattling little speeches, do to threaten her? He might as well have been a pittin dancing in a snow globe. _

_"Since you are reluctant to provide us with the location of the rebel base," Takin said, "I have chosen to test this station's destructive power on your home planet of Alderaan."_

No!_ Leia's attention immediately turned to the observation window. A blue-green globe, covered with clouds loomed in the distance. She didn't have to ask any more questions to verify what that was. What it had always been. _Home.

_Leia steeled herself once more, preparing herself for this very different, very psychological form of torture. Think. _Think!_ Forcing her mind to work now was like paddling up a waterfall. Yet she found the resolve to refuse the initial panic. _

_She looked up at Tarkin, who had broken eye contact and now only stared forlornly at the observation panel. Leia forced down all the words that first came to mind, all her knee-jerk reactions and just let the pause after his statement stretch to a silence, punctuated only by the click of Vader's infernal respirator._

_Eventually, Tarkin blinked, then looked down from the panel. Leia felt the reprieve of a small victory, knowing that she hadn't given him the sort of reaction he was looking for._

_"It's not too late to present another target. A military target." The governor turned back to her, his face still hard but his tone not as certain. "Where is your rebel base?"_

_She looked up at him, brown eyes defiant. She'd just endured the worst of Vader's cruelty and given him nothing. Tarkin's attempts would do no better._

_"You're pathetic," she hissed, the full range of her disdain and disgust encapsulated in her tone. "You wouldn't dare turn this station on Alderaan, any more than you would turn it on Corellia-or Coruscant, for that matter. The fallout would be inescapable. Governments across the galaxy would protest your senseless action. You'd be branded a mass murderer. A war criminal._

_She paused, drawing breath to sharpen her tone further. "Royal houses across the galaxy would curse you for assaulting one of their own. The Imperial Senate would call for your arrest. They'd scream for your blood. And Palpatine would oblige them, gleefully yanking this little toy from your hands before passing it off to the next Grand Moff in line. Because no matter how much you've done for your beloved Emperor, you're just a tool to him. Another interchangeable part in his giant war machine!"_

_He had not a single reaction to this rant. His gaunt features didn't tremble, didn't move in the slightest as she berated him and called his bluff. When she was done, she laughed at his face._

_"You can't intimidate me with your empty threats, Tarkin." _

_His pale blue eyes just took in her words, her vigorous defiance, assessing and calculating silently before he turned to the other senior officer. "Continue with the operation, you may fire when ready."_

_Leia just looked at the floor, grinning as she shook her head. They were determined to play out this charade to the very end, now weren't they?_

_There was a sudden green flash from the observation panel. Leia's neck snapped at attention as the laser sizzled across the screen, bridging the divide between the Death Star and the blue-green sphere. _

Home.

_Leia felt the explosion as if it had occurred right in front of her. A burst of unimaginable heat, blanketing her face. From the depths of her heart came a cacophony of screams that echoed across the chasm of her stunned mind. Billions of people-_herpeople_-were crying out in terror...before being silenced. Hushed. Along with all the memories of all her favorite places. Of the palace gardens where she used to play hide-and-seek with Winter. Of Aldera, its gorgeous spires and the picturesque mountains that served as its backdrop. Of the her aunt's mansion on the river in the south, where she used to spend summer vacation as a child._

_Her jaw hung slightly ajar as the thousand and one thoughts of home raced through her mind. She couldn't reconcile any of it with what was outside the viewport now: a smoldering wreckage of molten planetoid fragments. Burning rocks tumbling through space._

_"The Imperial Senate," Tarkin said, his tone a taunting whisper, "was disbanded three days ago."_

_She looked up at him, her eyes ablaze, filling with tears. _No! NO!_ She chided herself, fighting back all the emotion. She couldn't turn his victory into an absolute rout by giving him that satisfaction. She couldn't break this way. Not here, not now, not ever. Her refusal was absolute and unerring._

_She pushed all that emotion down, locking it away to rage forever behind bars of pride._

_"Take her away," Tarkin hissed. She never looked up to meet his gaze again._


	5. Chapter 3

Thousands of Imperial Army and Navy Troopers and white armor-clad Stormtroopers stood at ease, organized according to their military ranks and file. Hundreds of officers-army, navy and otherwise-stood with their troops. Beyond that, there were close to three dozen senior officers standing at ease as well.

The magnetic shield at the mouth of the Death Star's largest hangar bay lowered and a Lambda-Class shuttle flew in, its lower wings folding up as it set down to land. The landing ramp opened and came down. As it did, all of the men in attendance, enlisted and officer, stood at attention, tightening their stances.

General Maximilian Veers watched as the Red Guards paced out of the shuttle in twos, saluting Grand Moff Tarkin and High Admiral Motti as they exited.

"You'd think it was a reception for the Emperor himself," Admiral Kendal Ozzel whispered under his breath.

Veers hid his amusement, stifling a laugh by stroking his chin. It _was_ one of the largest military receptions he had ever seen, and comparisons to the sort of receptions the Emperor received were both appropriate and unsettling. In the back of his mind, he was wondering _why_ Tarkin and Motti had made such a monumental effort. Moments later, a young woman with bright, flame-red hair emerged from the shuttle and greeted Tarkin and Motti personally.

Veers frowned. She was far too young to have been an esteemed officer of any kind. She was probably still in her teens! But Tarkin and Motti gave to her the most respectable of gestures and she nodded along, her expression somewhere between bored and annoyed.

The General's frown deepened as the woman and the Death Star's two ranking officers walked down the reception hall, followed by the Red Guards. Was that...a lightsaber hanging from her belt? He'd only ever seen one since the end of the Clone Wars, and that was Vader's. After they left the hangar, the thousands of men that had stood at attention began to file out in an orderly fashion.

The past thirty-six hours had not been easy for him or for any of the other officers that served Lord Vader. Reports of the Sith Lord's death had shaken the core of officers and soldiers that served him. Circulating rumors said that Death Squadron and the corps of ground troops Veers commanded within Death Squadron would be dissolved and reassigned to different commands within the week.

The General had earned his command by personally demonstrating his brilliance on the battlefield to Lord Vader. His history with Vader went back a ways-almost sixteen years. Veers was much more than just a loyal soldier, he was the Dark Lord's confidant and co-conspirator. The point-man of Vader's many machinations and underhanded schemes.

Of course, secrets are secrets and no one else knew this. To everyone from the unassuming Naval historian to the involved Internal Affairs investigator, Veers appeared as nothing more than an Armor Commander. He had a stellar track record, but that was all.

Vader had been a boon to his career. No, more than that-Vader was his ticket to the next rungs of power. If there was anyone that had a legitimate chance of dethroning that madman Palpatine, it was Vader. But with Vader gone...

Veers stared hard at the floor as the troops began to file out of the landing bay. All those years of his life, all those schemes, all the personnel they had implanted in various positions of power across the mid- and outer-rim...with Vader gone, that was all for naught. Only he had the strength and power necessary to hold all those pawns in line.

Veers turned to exit. He ignored the snide, derisive stares of the other officers as he strode past. These were the players in the game: non-inheriting sons of royal houses from all corners of the galaxy, astute naval politicians, sycophants and yes-men-they all found their little niches in the Imperial Navy. Vader, as cruel and unforgiving as he was, at least handed out promotions based on skill and merit, with no consideration to royal lineage or political connections. But with Vader gone, Veers would now have to face the reality of the Imperial Military: skill and brilliance could not flourish without political maneuvering.

As he came to his shuttle, one of the executive aides approached him and handed him a small note card. Veers nodded to the man then examined the card after he left. On one side was small picture of a blue Stormtrooper helmet. It was a symbol of the 501st and, by extension, it's commander, Lord Vader. On the back was a suite number and a meeting time, written in fancy handwriting.

The General stepped away from his shuttle and dismissed his flight crew.

.

General Maximilian Veers walked into one of the private rooms of the "Hard Heart" Cantina on the lower levels of the Death Star. There were six other senior officers in the room, including Admiral Kendal Ozzel, Captain Lorth Needa of the ISD _Avenger_, Captain Firmus Piett of the ISD _Accuser_, Captain Xamuel Lennox of the ISD _Tyrant_, Captain Mulchive Wermis of the ISD _Devastator_ and General Crix Madine of the 501st Legion. These men were the ranking officers of the late Darth Vader's Death Squadron.

Veers gave a sharp nod as he closed the door. "Gentlemen."

Ozzel gestured to the open chair. "Have a seat, General."

"I think we all know why we're here," Wermis said as Veers took a seat.

"Yes, yes," Ozzel said, "it would seem that our shared political benefactor is dead."

Veers looked about cautiously, trying to figure out exactly what sort of trap this was. There was no telling who here had sold what favors to Tarkin or Palpatine or that redhead that seemed to be Vader's ordained replacement in the Sith Hierarchy. With Vader gone, he was_ vulnerable_.

"The rebels finally got him," Wermis said.

"That is, if you believe the official story as told by Tarkin," Piett said.

"_You_ doubt Tarkin?" Wermis asked.

Piett's gaze narrowed. "Don't you? Isn't Tarkin the one who has the most to gain from Vader meeting an unfortunate 'accident'?"

"Can we call it an accident?" Wermis asked. "Lord Vader took his personal squadron of TIEs against a rebel strike force with twice as many ships."

"No rebel pilot could shoot Vader down in a dogfight," Piett countered. "Besides, even if that _is_ how it happened, what do you think it says about Tarkin, considering the fact he didn't deploy any of the thousands of TIEs he has on this battlestation?"

Wermis had nothing to counter this, he only leaned back in his chair.

"What if the Emperor had Vader killed?" Lennox asked.

"But why would he do _that_?" Ozzel's incredulity seemed a bit forced. Veers was careful to take note.

"I don't know." Lennox shrugged. "You know how unforgiving the Emperor is. Perhaps Lord Vader displeased him somehow."

"Or maybe," Needa said, "he just found a better replacement."

"You talking about the woman?" Madine asked. "I saw her lightsaber too."

Lennox was incredulous. "She had a _lightsaber_?"

Ozzel and Madine both nodded.

"Then that means one thing." Piett licked his lips. "She is a Sith, too. Like Vader-"

"-like the Emperor," Veers added.

"Either way, we _are_ marked men," Piett said as he took off his cap and placed it on the table. "Our careers are finished, simply because we worked with and served Vader. The man had a lot of enemies."

"And that's it?" Ozzel scowled deeply as he asked the question. "You think Tarkin and Motti won't prep the guillotines anyways?"

"Why bloody the corpse if you've already severed the head?" Piett asked.

"Name one Grand Moff you know that didn't have a blood fetish," Needa said.

"Since you're being so pessimistic, why don't you tell us why we're not all dead yet?" Piett asked. "What for? We're already out without Vader. Why would he bother making such a mess?"

"We are Vader's loyal officers," Ozzel said. "Given the Star Destroyers under our command, we could be a very real threat to them-or to Vader's successor."

Veers flared a brow at the irony. Ozzel absolutely hated Vader when he was still alive.

"All Tarkin would have to do is reassign us to lesser posts," Piett said.

"He doesn't have that authority," Madine said, finally speaking for the first time. "Only Vader, or the Emperor himself, could."

Wermis exhaled slowly. "We need to start getting in the good with Vader's successor. The redhead girl doesn't seem all that disagreeable."

"It's too soon to tell," Piett said.

"I agree," Madine said, Needa and Lennox nodding in agreement.

Ozzel snorted dismissively and looked at Veers. "What do you think, General? You've been awfully quiet."

Veers folded his hands in front of his face, brooding silently in a moment of thought. He wasn't quite ready to hang himself with his own words yet. In that sense, he was far wiser than the other men in this room. After all, they were foolish enough to speak freely in front of Ozzel and Wermis. Lennox, Needa, Madine and Piett had all so quickly forgotten what set them apart from those two windbags. While some men were hand-picked by Vader to serve in Death Squadron, others were simply assigned.

Ozzel and Wermis belonged to the later category. The implication was this clear: they had never been there to serve with Vader's, or their colleagues' best interests at heart. Ozzel, in particular, was a scheming, disloyal navy politician. Vader was aware of the danger Ozzel posed too-when they were aboard Ozzel's ship, He always made sure to never speak of important matters in from to Ozzel, and even concealed his movements aboard the ship from Ozzel's men and security cameras.

Veers wouldn't be surprised if Ozzel was passing information along, serving as the Emperor's personal snitch, a set of eyes and ears into Vader's world. In fact, he probably called this meeting so he could get information on his peers and sell them out for a reward. Political machination was the only way Ozzel could get ahead in this military machine-his grasp of battlefield tactics was rudimentary at best.

Wermis could have been making similar plays, though Veers thought it less likely because he was a coward. No matter how much Tarkin or Vader's successor would have rewarded him, he was likely too afraid of the others to sell them out so wantonly. Veers and a large complement of his men were stationed aboard _Devastator_. He could, with little effort, wipe Wermis out and take his ship.

Still, the man was a risk. Veers narrowed his gaze as he scratched his temple and lowered his hands. Once again, he found that the wisest course of action was to say nothing, rather than speak the truth and potentially damn himself to Wilhuff Tarkin's enemy list.

"I think," Veers began, "that it's time for us to leave this station, get back to our ships, and continue to execute the orders we have, until we are given new ones."

Madine nodded, taking another nervous glance at the door. "I whole-heartedly agree."

With that, the seven senior officials closed the meeting and went their separate ways.

As he paced to the landing bay and took a seat in the private chambers of his shuttle, Veers once again thought of that massive reception he had attended earlier. Motti and Tarkin had literally called for thousands upon thousands of troops to gather in the Death Star's largest landing bay to salute the arrival of that Sith woman.

This thing had to have been planned from the top. The Emperor had ordered Vader killed. Veers was sure of it.

It made no difference who did the deed. With Vader gone, Veers had no future to aspire to within the Imperial Military. Alive, Vader was a source of prestige and respect. Dead, he would be a Pariah. Anyone who worked with him would be considered one as well. He would be lucky if he landed on his feet commanding a battalion, much less staying in command of the legion he had now.

Without a buffer like Vader, he would be sucked into the machine whole. It was time to get out now while he still could. Veers opened his tablet and started writing a message to Madine. He'd always had a back door ready in case of this scenario. It was time to put that into play.

* * *

><p>Luke Lars awoke with a gasp. His heart was racing, his body was sore, his head hurt. He was caked in dirt and grime. Somewhere in his descent, a tree branch clipped through the top of the cockpit, ripping the canopy open and exposing him to all of the dust and debris that shot up into the air like a dust bowl when he finally touched down on a grassy heath. He coughed several times and pressed his temples, hoping that that could somehow reduce the immense pressure he felt building within his skull.<p>

What had happened? He remembered hearing screams of pain that echoed through his mind as he made the descent, losing control of the craft as he started to go numb and black out. He was...on Yavin 5? Yes, he'd managed an extremely rough landing. He remembered looking up after the crash and seeing Yavin 4 blossom into fire. Then, there was nausea, pain...drowsiness. And sleep.

The sleep was most terrible at all. Those hours-or had it been days? He couldn't tell, he was so confused-of unconsciousness were so disturbing and restless that to call it sleep was a disservice to the basic language. He saw blurred gray and black shapes, shadows moving under the moonlight, trudging through a bog filled with nauseous, almost toxic fumes. There was a low groan that sent chills up his spine, and through it all, something that he could only describe as a lingering, malicious presence.

Luke almost heaved as he thought of it, more nausea rising from the pit of his stomach. He rubbed his chest whilst breathing deeply, trying to calm his elevated heart rate. The air on this planet was so thick with moisture that it was difficult for him to breathe.

He crawled up out of the X-Wing and stumbled onto the heath. Overhead, the skies were covered by deep gray clouds. Thunder boomed in the distance. Lightning flashes illuminated the severely damaged form of his T-65 X-Wing and the hundred meter-long wound in the plain that he'd produced during his crash landing. Smoke was still rising from the two starboard engines.

The winds picked up, eventually producing a gap in the cloud cover that exposed blue sky. The bright flash of Yavin 4 exploding into a million tiny pieces was no longer visible, but Luke could still see it in his mind's eye.

A sigh escaped him, as he knew that the galaxy at large would now be a victim to the Empire's new mega-weapon. In time, hundreds-if not thousands-of new systems would fall to the Emperor's cruel domineering grip. His hatred for the Empire waxed full once more, only to give way to more empty sorrow.

That horrible thought surfaced: he had _failed_ the galaxy and the Rebel Alliance.

And Biggs. _Biggs_!

Another uneasy breath; the humidity on this planet made breathing so damn difficult.

Biggs Darklighter was Luke's best friend. They grew up together, racing speeders, tagging womp rats...and he died up there in the Death Star trench, going down while trying to stall the enemy fighters so Luke could take the shot. Luke groaned against the guilt weighing on him. He shouldn't have taken the lead. Biggs should have. Biggs should have been the one to take the shot. He might have been able to make it. And Luke _knew _that he could have fared better at stalling that ace in the advanced TIE.

But he had taken the lead, ignoring the fact that Biggs had far more flight experience; ignoring the fact that that had been his first true dogfight; ignoring the fact that blasting womp rats in beggar's canyon and blasting a tiny exhaust port on the surface of the Death Star were two radically different things.

Biggs, ever dedicated to the cause, sacrificed himself for a greater good. But Luke's failure had essentially voided that noble gesture.

Luke ripped his helmet off and tossed it into the grass, all while screaming his head off.

Because of his blind overconfidence his best friend was dead! And that computer! That useless kriffing targeting computer!

Luke's despair deepened as he thoughts drifted to the Princess. She must have perished on that jungle moon, along with so many other members of the Alliance.

The emotions that overcame him dug deeper than his own sorrows. That nausea started to rise again and he wondered if that was a message or a signal from the Force. What had Ben told him about the Force? That it was an energy field, created by all living things? What then did the Death Star's destruction of an entire planet have upon it? Was that why he was so nauseous? Was he feeling, through the Force, the horror and sadness and pain of so many people being exterminated?

At his side, R2 whistled wistfully. Luke wiped his eyes and looked up at the blue astromech. He hadn't even noticed the droid climbing out of its terminal in the rear of the X-wing.

"I don't know, Artoo," he grumbled. "I don't know!"

Luke slammed his fist against the soil, flattening a section of hummus still damp from the last rainstorm. Then he stopped and looked up from the ground as he heard something. No, not heard-there was nothing audible, yet he still heard something, in his mind. It was something from that dream or nightmare-whatever it could be called.

A low, undulating groan. A sharp chill raced up his spine and every hair on his body seemed to stand on edge as he turned and faced the direction it came from. The pounding headache became a distant nagging as his body began to prime with adrenalin.

What was that? Was that...the Force?

He rose to his feet slowly, ignoring the R2-D2's whistles and beeps. He stood there, staring into the woods. Deep woods. Woods so thick and dark and overgrown that they were entirely foreign to this boy that had spent his entire life on a desert planet. The trees and branches and leaves conspired to hide from him whatever lurked there. There had to be danger-in fact, he was certain there was. But he couldn't resist.

One foot came down in front of the other and before long he was walking towards the source of that otherworldly groan.

The woods were dark and harrowing; the wind whistled through the branches and leaves, adding to the cacophony of animal noises and creatures scurrying about in the dark that kept Luke on edge. He kept his hand on his belt, inches from his holdout blaster and his father's lightsaber. All-in-all, he was a decent shot, but if it came down to it, he had no idea of what to do with the Jedi weapon. He'd probably end up hurting himself as much as his yet-to-be-seen foe. R2 followed him, projecting a thin beam of light that cut through the woods with his holographic projector.

After several hours of walking, he came to a wreckage in the forest. It was a jumble of dented and broken black panels and shredded gray sheet metal sprawled across the jungle floor and caught within the canopy trees. Broken pieces of glass and torn out circuitry scattered across what appeared to be the epicenter of the crash site. The remains of the craft itself were too badly damaged to be recognized. Except for...was that...the cockpit?

A sudden _whooosh_ of air disturbed the trees above, scattering leaves and branches. Luke looked up and saw flashes of light-too concentrated and shaped to be lightning-followed by the roar of what had to be a repulsorlift engine. R2 beeped and directed his tiny beam of light up into the trees, where it momentarily caught a figure dressed in black. Luke could barley make out the black shape as it moved through the trees, climbing down branches with superhuman agility. His hand went for his blaster as it leaped down from the canopy, landing in a roll just meters away from him.

He drew. He was too late. The person rolled and landed a kick to the back of his legs, sweeping him into his feet and onto the flat of his back. A knee fell upon his chest, pinning him to the leafy forest floor as a snap-hiss of released plasma echoed through the woods. Red energy arced down from the black figure's right arm, stopping just short of searing his head off.

"Who are you?" It asked in a low whisper, with a voice that was deep but distinctly feminine. "Where is my master?"

"I-I don't know!" Luke gasped. "Who are you?"

A thin sliver of eyes and eyebrows were the only visible part of her body. Her face and head was wrapped in a black tagelmust, her body, in sheer black robes. Even her hands were wrapped in black leather as they grasped tightly the source of the energy blade she held at Luke's throat.

Luke suddenly realized what she was holding. "That's a lightsaber!"

Her eyes widened, betraying a dull green color that appeared brown under the red glow of her blade. "Yes, and I'm very, very skilled at using it. Where is my master?"

"I don't know! I just crashed on this planet too and walked into the woods and found this wreckage. I don't even know who your master is-or what he is."

She lowered the weapon and considered him sharply for a moment, looking him up and down before lifting her knee from his chest and taking back-but not switching off-the lightsaber.

Luke panted heavily as he slowly sat up. "Are you...a Jedi?" He swallowed. "Only Jedi carry that kind of weapon."

She pointed at the lightsaber on his belt. "Shouldn't I be asking the same of you?"

"I..." He looked down at his father's lightsaber then back up at her. "This isn't mine."

She deactivated her lightsaber and folded her arms across her chest. "Then how exactly did you get it? A Jedi would never willingly part with her weapon. It is her life."

Luke looked away, blinking several times as his mouth fell agape for a moment. "It was my father's. He died a long time ago."

She snorted. "Impossible. Jedi don't have children."

He glared at her. "Obi-Wan Kenobi told me so."

"You...you know _Obi-Wan Kenobi_?" She spoke the name with reverence. "Are you...his apprentice?"

Luke bit his lip. "I knew him, yes, but...he's gone now. He was killed. On the Death Star."

She sighed, then inclined her head to the canopy above, the cloudy glow from the sky beyond glinting in her eyes. She reached up for the tagelmust, releasing a pin that secured a part of the cloth that masked much of her face. She was young-younger than he had expected-and beautiful as well.

"It all makes sense now," she said. "Master said that Master Kenobi had returned. And that he had a new student. I'm sorry for suspecting you. We're just...not exactly meeting under good terms. I'm Shira, by the way. Shira Brie."

She took off a glove and extended her hand. Luke smiled and took it in his own.

"Luke Lars."

She nodded. "A pleasure. Any friend of Kenobi's is a friend of mine. But we have to go and find my master. Judging from the scene here, he can't be well...wait!"

Shira paced off and Luke followed, R2 trailing them at a distance. She gestured some damage in the trees. Diagonal cuts that appeared to be the result of plasma burns.

"You and I both know that there's only one kind of weapon that does this," she said.

He nodded. "Lightsaber."

"Look at the ground," she said. "It's still a little wet from the last rain. It's hard to make out specific footprints-there's too many of them. It's a jumble of quick, rapid movements-there was a struggle here!"

Luke frowned. "Your...master?"

Shira shook her head. "I've heard bad things about this moon. There are dangerous creatures that live here. Not just animals, but sentient beings too."

"Smugglers?"

She shook her head slowly. "Worse. They'd have to be very powerful to take my master alive. Even wounded, he's a very powerful warrior. Come on, I think the trail leads down this way."

He nodded and moved to follow.

"I hope Obi-Wan taught you how to use that lightsaber," Shira said as she turned to glance at him over her shoulder.

Luke flushed slightly at the thought of actually using his father's lightsaber in a fight. Being pinned down like that was embarrassing enough. He hoped he could avoid any further humiliation.


	6. Chapter 4

Leia awoke slowly, opening her eyes to the blur that was the cockpit of General Tano's ship. What had she called it again? _Twilight_? She leaned forward and rubbed her head. In doing so, the pillow that had been secured between her head and the headrest fell to the floor. She looked up as a trail of footsteps echoed through the cockpit. General Tano stood over her, cup in hand.

"Tea?" She asked, presenting the cup to Leia. "Didn't know if you liked sweetener, so I didn't add any."

"I'm...in the mood for something bitter, anyway," Leia said, taking the cup and sipping it slowly. "Where are we going?"

"A safe house, on Ansion."

Leia chuckled weakly. "You sure this grease bucket can make it all the way there?"

"This grease bucket survived the Clone Wars," she said with a smile, "it's a lot tougher than you'd think."

Leia lowered the cup from her mouth. "General Tano, you fought in the Clone Wars?"

"Please, call me Ahsoka," she said. "And yes, I did."

Leia asked, "Is that how you knew my father?"

The Jedi's voice was hesitant. "Yes...I am a Jedi Knight, as Obi-Wan was. We served with your father."

Leia's features softened as she remembered the old Jedi's ghastly fate aboard the Death Star.

A long silence passed before the Jedi looked up and met her gaze. "Were you with him when he passed?"

Leia bit her lip, then said, "I saw him fall to Darth Vader."

The Jedi just turned away and gazed at the blue blur of hyperspace. Leia knew nothing about Asoka, or her people, but what she saw in the Jedi's eyes was a sense of grief that cut deeper than any words could describe. It was more than emotion, it was understanding and acceptance of some dark, hideous truth.

Leia didn't know much about the Jedi, only that they were a stoic people by nature. Everything else she had learned came from stories her father had told her growing up. By his account, they were legendary, almost mythical, people that kept peace in the Old Republic for thousands of years. They had amazing powers, beyond the understanding of reason, technology or even science. Powers that people like Darth Vader now wielded.

"Did he speak to you before he passed?"

Leia shook her head.

"Listen, there are a lot of things that Obi-Wan had to tell you." Ahsoka paused. "Things that Bail should have told you a long time ago."

Leia perked up. "What should my father told me?"

"Bail Organa was not your father." Ahsoka's voice seemed quite irritated.

Leia reacted as if she'd been slapped. "Excuse me? Just what do you mean by that?"

Ahsoka's eyes narrowed. "You were adopted. They did tell you that, right?"

Memories of secondary school came rushing back. One of the mean girls-Leia couldn't even remember her name-had poked fun of the fact that she didn't look at all like her parents. When she came home, upset and confused, Bail and Breha explained to her that they had adopted her when she was an infant, not even a day old.

It was one of those memories she had intentionally buried and forgotten. She had no interest in digging into the past, for she believed that influences and teachings were what defined her, not origins and biological ancestry. After all, what is a person if not an amalgam of all the influences they'd fallen under? She was created by Breha's love and Bail's teaching and...

"What are you insinuating?" Leia's voice was furious hiss. "You're saying my parents lied to me?"

Ahsoka was stolid. "They hid the truth."

"Bail Organa was my father, and I have followed in his footsteps. I served-"

"Your birth mother was a Senator in the Old Republic."

She felt a heat on her face that she hadn't felt since the destruction of Alderaan. Tears welled in her eyes as she glanced at the Jedi then glanced away. The emotional void that manifested in the core of her being was a seed of doubt. From that seed grew an anger that she couldn't control.

Ahsoka sighed. "Bail Organa was a good man. He raised you well. But he was not your father. I knew your father-"

"I never met him." The statement came out as a cold, but forceful scoff. "So what does that matter?"

"There's no sense in being angry with him. It's not his fault that he died before you were born."

Leia started to shake her head, the confused feelings of guilt and resentment boiling into a soup of anger. "Exactly who are you? What right do you have to speak to me like this? You don't even know me."

"On the contrary, your Majesty, I know you very well." Ahsoka leaned back in her chair, skewering Leia with her calm stare. "I have been your guardian, always one or two steps ahead of you whenever you left Alderaan."

Leia glared at the Jedi. "Then where were you when Darth Vader boarded my ship and took me prisoner?"

"I was on Toprawa. I helped ensure that you got the Death Star plans in the first place."

"And what about my capture?"

"Do you think it's a coincidence that the ship that came to rescue you just so happened to be the fastest in the galaxy, piloted by one of the best Wookie operators in a galaxy, captained by a... halfway decent Corellian?"

"You knew that nerf herder?"

Ahsoka laughed at the description of Han Solo. "An old friend of mine."

Leia refused to accept the explanation. "Then why weren't you with them?"

She curled her lips in a subtle, but acrid expression of grief. "Because Obi-Wan went in my place."

So, this was the true nature of Ahsoka's grief-deeper than loss and sorrow, it was guilt. That squalid feeling that always lingered below everything else and could never be scrubbed clean from a person's psyche. Leia had indirectly caused the deaths of billions of people by mistakenly trying to call Tarkin's bluff. That was something she would have to deal with, a burden should have to carry for the rest of her life, the secret she could never share or otherwise allow to escape the prison of her own mind.

"There are so many things that have been hidden from you for far too long," Ahsoka said, unmistakable determination in her eyes. "The truth about your origins, your lineage-your destiny."

Leia shook her head slowly. She wasn't sure she wanted to know-

"I was there when you were born on Polis Massa, when your mother died after giving you the only thing she could: your name."

Leia covered her temples with her palms, overwhelmed the glut of information. Those short sentences contained answers to questions that always lingered in the back of her mind, questions that she always entertained but never truly wished to be answered. The truth infected her mind, a poison that obliterated the basis for her entire existence.

What rose from below to replace that shattered facade was a desolate feeling of emptiness. No matter how which much she wished she could deny it, she knew that what the Jedi had said was true. Bail and Breha had withheld the entire truth from her.

But could she have blamed them? She had never asked them directly about her birth parents or her origins. She had never even expressed interest- her adoption was something she liked to gloss over and forget, if only because she was so happy and content with the family that had adopted her.

"...Leia-"

Ahsoka was interrupted by a flashing light and a beeping noise on the console. The Jedi frowned then pulled down on the drive lever. _Twilight_ emerged from hyperspace with a sudden jerk and a yellow-green globe shot into view. Ahsoka took the controls and prepared to make the approach.

She continued, "you have to know that-"

"Please." Leia raised a hand in protest while leaning to the other side of the chair, retreating from the conversation. "Not now. Please. I don't...what is this place?"

Ahsoka pursed her lips, then nodded, taking the defeat in stride. "Ansion of the Ansion system. A place of wide, sweeping plains, rolling winds and high hills. And suubatars."

"Never heard of it," Leia said.

"I'm not surprised," Ahsoka said as she received clearance from a local spaceport to dock. "This is a very coarse, uncouth world. Hardly a place for royalty. Your better sensibilities will be offended."

Leia gave a blank nod. "I think I can handle it."

"I hope you can," Ahsoka said as she locked the autopilot in and rose from her seat. "You should get dressed. Come, there's a full refresher in the back. I have an extra change of clothes for you."

* * *

><p>Ahsoka and Leia emerged from Docking Bay 94 dressed in Mirialan robes. Leia had picked the robes out from Ahsoka's collection and Ahsoka approved, feeling that the black, voluminous attire to be appropriate for a crude, windy world like this one.<p>

Ahsoka led the way into the proper part of the spaceport. All of the hallways were littered with merchant stalls and hand-pulled rickshaws. The Jedi Knight tried her best to ignore the sounds of merchants shouting to attract customers to buy their wares. It was easy enough to phase out the shouting of one or two individuals, but the combined jabbering of six or more merchants trying to drown each other out in one crowded alley was a little more than what Ahsoka was willing to tolerate.

Harder to ignore than the merchants, though, were the male customers, the tamest, least offending of which simply gawked rudely until another female entered their field of vision. The bolder ones made whistling noises or rude, sexual comments that made the Princess blush. And once in a while, a _real_ piece of Bantha dung would walk with the two women and make very explicit requests to see exactly what they were hiding under their robes.

Still, the togruta Jedi kept her pace even, greeting all of the improper come-ons and utterly untoward remarks with the same indifferent expression. That is, she ignored them until one of the scum actually put a hand on Leia. Ahsoka turned with unnatural swiftness, striking the man with a devastating Teräs Käsi punch and landing a smack across his face before even Leia could react.

The man, a gruff thirty-something year-old with bags under his eyes and the bulging veins of a hardcore spice-addict, stumbled back several meters and landed flat on his back, all while clutching his gut. Ahsoka confidently looked up from her handiwork at the small crowd that had stopped in their tracks to observe the scuffle.

"Anyone else want to try me?" Ahsoka asked.

Satisfied when all the other harassers stepped off, Ahsoka nodded to Leia.

"Thanks," Leia said, "but I think I could've handled that myself."

Ahsoka smiled then turned heel. The girl had followed her mother's path but was still so much like her father. She led the Princess out of the spaceport and onto the Cuipernam city streets. Ten minutes' walk later, they came to the entrance of a small cantina called _The Night's Whisper_. This was where Ahsoka normally met with the advance agent from the Rebel Alliance.

Abruptly, the Jedi stopped. Within the sea of nondescript feelings and emotions from crowds in the streets, Ahsoka sensed the specific malice of one powerful individual directed against them. And that solitary feeling was, itself cloaked like a whisper against the mighty Ansonian wind. Whoever this person was, they were actively trying to hide themselves with the Force.

Ahsoka turned away from _The Night's Whisper_ and led the Princess on a zig-zag through the city streets while actively combing the Force with her mind's eye for answers. Occasionally, she would stop to peruse some of the nicer, more established merchandise outlets to shop like a real tourist. She even bought some Ansonian bangles.

Knight Tano did not survive the purge by being sloppy.

After about forty-five minutes of this, Leia began to lose her patience and grumble under her breath.

"Something wrong, Leia?" Ahsoka asked as she walked up to a tea stand run by a kind-looking Duros woman.

"We're wasting time," Leia grumbled.

Ahsoka considered her wearily before opening the small green box that the Duros had presented her with and taking in the gentle fragrance of the Nabooian Lavender. Leia's mind was hardened and sealed off, difficult to read and impossible to penetrate. She had no way of telling what sort of dogmas of delusions Leia might have been brought up with in House Organa.

Ahsoka had never approved of what Obi-Wan did with Anakin's children. That was the first in a long list of disagreements she had with him, disagreements she was forced to table because Yoda always sided with Obi-Wan. At least Luke was raised by his family, and protected by the obscurity of his backwater planet and the Lars family name.

But Leia...why give her away to a stranger? No, to call Bail that was unfair. After all, his actions on the eve of Palpatine's betrayal proved that he was an unshakable friend of the Jedi. But the Naberrie clan were friends of the Jedi also. They were Padmé's family and they deserved to know that one of their daughter's children had survived. Perhaps if they had to contend with that responsibility, they never would have gotten themselves into a losing battle on Naboo...

If Leia had been raised more appropriately, she would have had a better understanding of her place in the galaxy. Luke grew up hearing stories of his father's heroics as told by Obi-Wan. That was why he was so willing to commit to the path and face his destiny when the Empire came to Tatooine. Leia had no clue. And this...aristocratic mindset she'd been raised with made her less willing to accept her destiny.

Impressed with the Lavender and the memories of Naboo they inspired, Ahsoka continued to peruse the wares of the stand. After finishing with another customer, the Tea dealer approached and Ahsoka smiled while speaking with her at length about teas distilling processes. As all this occurred, Ahsoka intermittently looked up at the rooftops, trying to get a visual of the stalker she felt through the Force.

"Just be patient," Ahsoka said finally answered to Leia. "Relax."

"But we have time for shopping, right?" Leia put her hands on her hips as Ahsoka handed the Duros woman a ten credit bill. In exchange, she gave her a small durasteel thermajug filled with piping hot lavender tea.

Ahsoka turned to the Princess, finding her tone most irritating. "Don't you feel the Force?"

Leia frowned. "What?"

Ahsoka pulled her close and whispered, "we're being followed. You don't have diplomatic immunity anymore, your highness."

The Princess nodded sharply, her brown eyes contrite.

"Don't worry," Ahsoka said as they walked away from the stall. Her eyes were still focused on those rooftops. "Patience wasn't one of your father's strong points, either."

Leia suddenly stopped. "Please, stop bringing that up. I don't want to talk about it."

"But you have to," Ahsoka said. When Leia said nothing and merely fidgeted under her glare, she continued, "I will, until you feel comfortable enough to face the truth yourself."

Leia sighed and paced forward until she was once again at Ahsoka's side. "Exactly what is the Force? You're not the first person I've heard refer to it. I mean, I know its some kind of god or something, but as a Jedi who actually believes and knows about it, I want to know from your perspective just what it is."

Ahsoka led on, taking a turn at the next corner and reaching out as she felt minor vibrations chasing after them. "The Force is not a god, but it exists, whether you believe in it or not."

"Well, what is it, then?"

"It's an energy field created by all life. It surrounds us and binds the galaxy together." Ahsoka paused as she tried to focus on echoes she felt in her montrals. "It is the source of our powers. It is what I am trying to use to find our stalkers right now." She looked at Leia. "You could learn to use the Force if you tried."

"Me?" Her expression twisted with disbelief. "Oh, no. That can't be. I've seen the powers of the Jedi, like Galen Marek and there's no way I could ever even understand that, much less command it-"

"Oh, believe me, command of the Force runs in your blood," Ahsoka said. "You're already using it, you just don't realize it."

Leia's frown deepened.

"In the War Room on Yavin 4, you knew that Luke missed before he even said anything." Ahsoka paused to let the relevance of her words seep in. "I suspect those little instincts have been with you your whole life and you've always dismissed it as just intuition or coincidence. It's not. That is the Force."

The Princess' expression shifted from disbelief to wonder. "How can I...control it?"

"You'll hear the Force when you're calm and at peace,"Ahsoka said. "You must meditate."

"Can you teach me?"

She turned to face the Princess and considered her thoughtfully. "You will be taught, Leia, but you're not yet ready for the level of instruction I can give you."

"Why?"

"Who are your parents, Leia?" Ahsoka simply shook her head when Leia looked away. It would take some time to train this one. She had her father's stubbornness.

They were back to the same intersection where they had started. All those enemies were still distant echoes in the Force. She reached for her communicator saw that she'd just received a new message from Zev. She started typing in a response, grinning as she did. As her master had once taught her, sometimes the best way to deal with a trap was to spring it.

* * *

><p>Leia and Ahsoka were at the corner of Lemelie and Pichella, waiting. Leia sighed through gritted teeth. All of this waiting was driving her mad. Simply getting into contact with Mon Mothma had never taken this long before. Her frustration with her Jedi "protector" was mounting.<p>

Leia's head was still spinning from what Ahsoka had said on _Twilight_ just after they escaped Yavin 4. Now the woman was making these revelations about her having some magical powers? The Princess took a sidelong look at the Togruta, whose water blue eyes seemed to be lost in some otherworldly trance. Just who the hell did she think she was, to walk into _her_ life and rip the rug out from under her. To bombard her with these unwarranted disclosures.

Her ancestry, the past...it was all irrelevant. None of it mattered. It would only influence her destiny if she allowed it to. And it wouldn't. She refused. She repudiated these so-called "birth parents," because she was the daughter of Bail Organa and Breha Organa, who had loved and cherished and cared for her. And that was the truth she would hold fast to, no matter what General Tano had to say.

"Zev!" Ahsoka said to a man that approached.

Zev looked like a man in his middle twenties, with long, dark hair tied back into a loose braid and a lean build. He was handsome but he also had a relatively common look. His was the sort of face that could disappear into a crowd with ease.

He smiled. "Good to see you, master."

"I take it you know the Princess of Alderaan." Ahsoka gestured to Leia.

"I..." His voice trailed off and his expression took the shape of a frown. It took several moments for the look of deep consternation to pass before he bowed respectfully. "Welcome to Ansion, Majesty. Unfortunately, your stay is probably going to be a little short."

"You mean _fortunately_, right?" Leia said, hands on her hips.

"If that's how you feel about this planet, then I suppose. I actually like the place. People here are honest." He shrugged. "I'm Zev."

"No last name?" The Princess asked.

"Veers," he said before turning to Ahsoka and losing all interest in her. "Master, you should go. It's not safe for you here. Imperial Stormtroopers landed in the city several minutes ago."

"I know," Ahsoka said.

Leia's frown deepened. If the Jedi _knew_ they were at risk, why hadn't they left earlier? Why take the risk of staying here and waiting to contact this...spy? She took another sidelong look at Ahsoka. Just what sort of protector was she anyway?

"We should leave, Master," Zev said.

"Yeah," Leia echoed. "Especially considering what he said about Stormtroopers."

"I can handle Stormtroopers," Ahsoka said sternly. "But it is time for the two of you to leave."

Zev scowled. "You want me to take Her Majesty with me?"

"Yes," Ahsoka said with a nod, her eyes scanning the rooftops south of them.

"Wait, now _you're_ leaving me?" Leia's expression shifted with disgust. "I thought you were my protector-"

"I can't do a good job of protecting you if I'm being hunted, now, can I? And don't worry. Zev will protect you. He knows many places where you will be safe." Ahsoka turned to Zev and gave a sharp nod. "I will contact you when I've lost these Jedi Hunters."

Then the Jedi General turned around, an arc of green flame extended from her hand. The gruff man that had been standing behind them screamed in pain as his weapon hand, blaster and all, was severed and Ahsoka kicked him in the gut, knocking him flat on his back.

Leia blinked, at once taken aback by the brutal, yet effective action. Despite all of the doubts she had felt and almost voiced about Ahsoka's religion, she swore she _felt_ something the moment Ahsoka's lightsaber came to life. Blasterfire started raining from the rooftops and the Jedi became a blur of motion, her emerald blade swinging everywhere to deflect shots back at the face of the building as the crowded street cleared with a commotion of panicked screams.

The Princess just watched until Zev tugged on her arm and pulled her away so they could make their escape down a back alley and into one of the smaller spaceports.


	7. Chapter 5

This meeting could not have been planned at a better time. Tarrth, a small world in the mid-rim with cultural and racial ties to Alderaan was revolting against Imperial rule. All across the planet, mobs demanding bread and justice were storming Imperial garrisons with hunting rifles and improvised incendiary cocktails. Imperial officials were being hanged and eviscerated in the streets. The governor was besieged in his own capital.

Word from his intel connections was that that would be the Death Star's next deployment. It would seem that there was no limit to Tarkin's blood lust.

The doors to the briefing room slid open and a squad of stormtroopers walked in.

"Gentlemen," Veers said, considering the stormtroopers thoughtfully, before nodding to Aigel Thazj and Horan Kor, his Colonels. Thazj opened a small tablet device that Veers knew was a wireless a scrambler and started typing in commands. After a moment, he nodded to Veers, indicating that all of the cameras in this particular briefing room aboard the ISD _Devastator _had been set in a feedback loop.

The stormtroopers started taking off their helmets, revealing their true idenities. Crix Madine, General of the 501st Legion, was at the head of the squad, followed by his retainers, Colonel Mardos Pell and Commander Daine Jir. Captains Xamuel Lennox, Lorth Needa and Gaman Kelemann were amongst the others, along with a handful of Commanders and Lieutenants-important bridge officers-from their respective Star Destroyers. Altogether, Madine, Veers, Needa, Lennox and Kelemann represented men that Vader had hand-picked to serve aboard Death Squadron. Their retainers were men that they had selected themselves, men whose silence and loyalty were assured.

Veers and his colonels rose to greet the officers and exchange handshakes and pleasantries. There were some deep bows and nods of respect, sincere shows of loyalty and the deepest commitment. It was, for them, the last expressions of uncertainty, a violent stamping to solve the problem of cold feet before they got on to their real business.

Just before they broke to take their seats at the table, Veers pulled Kelemann aside and whispered a question beyond an earshot of the others.

"Did you have any people on Alderaan when it happened?" Veers asked.

Kelemann's stony face said little, but his eyes said enough. "My parents were living in a retirement home on Aldera."

"I am so sorry, my friend."

Kelemann said nothing else, he just nodded, then broke off and took his seat at the table.

"Well?" Lennox said, lips quivering for a moment. "Where shall we begin?"

Thazj leaned forward, his hands folded over the table. "I think this should go without saying, but for posterity's sake, I should put it out there: nothing said here can leave this room, not until we have decided our course of action and made sure that our men are with us."

"Agreed," one of Lennox's officers said. Then the rest of them nodded, still unable to push past the anxiety that settled over all of them. These were all career officers, men whose lives had been almost entirely spent in the service of the Empire and its ideals. If defection-or at least, desertion-was to be the topic of this meeting, then where could any of them possibly begin?

"How about a declaration of intent?" Veers proposed.

"Or at least a reasoning behind it," Madine said, twiddling his thumbs. "I'm sick. Sick of Tarkin, Palpatine, the Empire, everything. I don't know about the rest of you. I know some of you are younger than me, some of you older, but I was...just an enlisted man when Palpatine come to power. I believed his promise of a new order. I believed his mantra about security and peace..."

"We all did, Crix," Needa said.

"It's sickening, isn't it?" Lennox asked. "What our Empire is becoming."

Veers tapped his fingers on the table "When I took my first first command, the Emperor was still the Supreme Chancellor. We still _voted_."

Madine nodded. "And now he's uncontested Emperor and he has a superweapon and all of us here are at least partly responsible."

Lennox chuckled bitterly. "Oh, how far gone is our honor. The glory of our victories _tainted _by sick pittins like Tarkin."

"Or Vader," Madine said.

Lennox's eyes twinged with pain and he pursed his lips and looked away. Needa just kept silent. Madine knew; all of them, to an extent, hated themselves for allowing themselves to change so easily with the Empire.

"But what do we do now?" Madine asked. "No matter how skilled or competent Vader might have found us, our lives as we knew them are over."

Veers closed his eyes and scratched the bridge of his nose. If there was one thing that infuriated him the most about the events of the past few days, it was this. "And pretty soon," he began, "we won't even have a place in the house of sins we built. Listen, I have friends in intelligence."

"Is that why you always seem to know more than you should?" Kelemann asked.

Veers only smiled. "My friends have intercepted this transmission, between Admiral Ozzel and Grand Moff Tarkin."

Veers placed his palm-sized projector on the table and a hologram of Kendall Ozzel appeared.

_"As per your request, Grand Moff, I have learned some more information about possible conspirators within my command. After speaking with some of our Captains and Generals, I have come to these conclusions-Wermis, though incompetent and cowardly, is loyal and will continue to serve you as he had served Lord Vader. The rest...they are too committed to accept you as a new commander. Vader kept them on long leashes because he trusted them and they served him well. But they are all very suspicious of you and of what happened to Vader in the Battle of Yavin. They could be plotting against you as we speak. I will continue to monitor them until I have further orders._"

Madine swallowed hard as the intercepted transmission ended.

Needa's jaw clamped. "That filthy scrag."

"Tarkin's going to have our heads before long," Lennox said.

"Maybe," Needa began, his voice barely over a strained whisper, "it's time that we leave the Empire. I've been saving my money away. Last month, I used an alias to make a stealthy purchase of several thousand acres of farmland on a small, insignificant planet outside the Empire's jurisdiction. It is absolutely beautiful."

"So that's it?" Kelemann scoffed. "You're just going to run?"

"Well, you know what's happening, Gaman!" Needa countered. "Blast, it, the Emperor's got no more use for us. We're dead."

Lennox gave a sharp nod. "Now that the sides are being drawn, do you see _any_ honor in our choices?"

"Sirs, if I may?" Mardos Pell interjected. "After seeing that video, I would give anything-even my life-to get back at that bastard Ozzel. If you're looking for honor, Captain Lennox, then there might be some in taking that stang down a notch or two."

"Gentlemen," Veers said, "there's more. My friends in intel had information on the Death Star's latest deployment. They're going to Tarrth."

Needa's camp immediately fell into disarray. Captain Needa, and as a result of his prejudices, all of his handpicked bridge officers, were natives of Tarrth. Needa was shaking his head part in panic, part in anger. "They won't have a chance. Tarrth doesn't even have a deflector shield!"

Madine was equally horrified. "It'll be a genocide..."

"That kriffing Eriduian stang!" A commander from Needa's ship roared, slamming his fist on his desk. "Tarkin won't rest until he's spilled every drop of Old Alderaan blood, will he?"

"We have options, gentlemen," Madine said. "I know someone. Someone...who can get us in touch with Rebel High Command."

"Defect?" Lennox gasped. "I think there's no point in that now, given how Tarkin annihilated most of their military."

"There will always be people willing to rise up against injustice," Madine said firmly. "That is the flaw in Tarkin's doctrine. The spirit cannot be broken by fear alone. The only question that remains is if _we_ are men willing to take such a stand."

Lennox's visage sharpened. "But how could we look at our men in the eyes, and tell them to betray their vows, the loyalty they swore to the Empire?"

"An Empire that no longer exists!" Madine said. "That's been corrupted from the very top! Besides, don't you remember what you said in that briefing room? Our men _are_ loyal to us!"

Veers raised his hand, trying to calm the table and break up the staccato of side-arguments that Madine's comments had triggered. Even after the table had calmed, he took a moment, several clarifying breaths to compose his thoughts.

"How close are you to your men? How well do you know them? I can say, with confidence, and without any embellishment, that I am closer to my men than any Imperial commander I have ever met."

Madine raised his brows. "You still ride point, all the time."

"And they think I'm a hero for it. They will love any commander willing to ride or die with them. But that's not the point. The point is, if any of you were as close to your men as I am, then you would know that they are deeply unhappy. Ever since the emergence of the Death Star and news of Alderaan, morale has been in a free fall. We've had years of dealing directly with a man as cold and harsh as Vader, of reading the Emperor's orders for ourselves. We've been thoroughly desensitized to the sorts of cruelty that our leadership is capable of. But our men aren't. And now that the Emperor has unleashed this new weapon, so destructive that even his galaxy-sized propaganda machine can't hide its effects, our men are starting to realize just what a horrible thing they are a part of.

"Tell me, how many of your men are Alderaanians? How many are Tarrthi? How many of them serve directly under a Lieutenant or Sergeant or that is? And how many of your men don't give a blind nerf about politics or policy, so long as they get to serve alongside the men of their platoons, whom they have, over the years, learned to call 'brother?'" Veers took a moment to let his words sink in. "When all of you can answer these questions-as I am-then maybe, we might be able to move together."

Kelemann looked up from his hands. "And if we were to move, exactly how would we?"

"Ozzel would have to be dealt with first, obviously," Veers said.

"He's quartered aboard the _Tyrant_," Lennox said, referring to the ship that was his own command. "I'll deal with that scum."

Veers nodded. "Capture him. He might be worth interrogating. I can move against Wermis. My men are stationed here and his crew too much respect for me and my reputation to stop me."

"And then?" Needa asked.

"We set a course, somewhere far and away," Veers said. "Perhaps beyond the galactic rim. But of course, this is all speculatory. I know that I am ready. My men would follow me into hell in a hand basket if that was my wish. Can you be certain of your own?"

Madine and his retainers were already nodding. His command was stormtroopers, the 501st, which had been Vader's personal legion since fall of the Old Republic. They had a solidarity that matched Veers' own Thundering Herd. If Madine made the call to defect, they would follow him. But as Veers looked further down the table, he was surprised to see nods from Kelemann, then Lennox, then Needa.

* * *

><p>Zevulon Veers sat in the quarters of his Starlight-Class light freighter, the <em>Durasteel Gull<em>, browsing through a codex on his datapad. Twenty years ago, after Operation: Knightfall and Darth Vader's slaughter of all the Jedi in the Temple, Obi-Wan Kenobi managed to secretly enter the Temple and download a portion of the vast archives into a data disc, which he brought back to the new Jedi Council in hiding. This codex, a manual on training novices by Master Gromo, was a part of that archive Kenobi had rescued all those years ago.

Zev sighed and put the datapad down. His eyes stung from reading day-and-night, trying to get his mind around some of the training techniques Ahsoka had used to teach him years ago. He knew then, when he made his commitment to the Jedi Order, that training an apprentice would be one of his duties. This was his pledge: to be a protector of the Jedi Order's secrets and a custodian to its teachings. To seek out those sensitive to the Force and protect them from the machinations of the Empire. To teach them the Jedi way so that they might strengthen the Order to its former might and bring down the Sith that now rule the galaxy unopposed.

Yes, he had pledged that much when he accepted Ahsoka's tutelage eight years ago, but he had never thought that the time for him to pass on what he learned would come so quickly. He hardly considered himself a fully trained Jedi Knight. After all, there were some abilities-Force speed, Telekinesis-that he still had not learned to use. And perhaps he would never learn. After all, his body was far less attuned to the Force than others'.

Master Ahsoka had told him, time and time again, that he had made the best of his potential, that he surpassed all of her expectations. That was enough to be proud of. And besides, he was born on a highly populated Core World, a place where the Empire used scanners to ferret out anyone with a count higher than five thousand. _If_ he had a greater attunement to the Force, then he would have been abducted and murdered during his childhood, just like the thousands of other Force-Sensitives Vader and Sidious had discovered over the years.

He took another deep breath and exhaled slowly, once again feeling his insecurities grow more distant. As Master Ahsoka had said, everything happens for a reason. He was grateful enough to have met her and have learned the ways of the Force under her tutelage. Despite his limitations, he knew he was a great asset to the Jedi Order in hiding and a great asset to the Rebellion. The powers he had were enough to enable him to do his duty.

But did that qualify him to teach? He wasn't a natural teacher like Pooja was-his attempts to lead a class at the academy on Naboo often produced mixed results, with his explanations and examples _sometimes_ getting the children to understand and sometimes leaving them bewildered. Furthermore, who want to take lessons from a weak master?

Either way, Ahsoka had also instructed him to teach Leia some Force Meditation techniques and some of the basics of Teräs Käsi. This struck him as strange-the Jedi Order was not known to take people into training so lightly. Ahsoka and Ferus had screened him intensively when he first met them all those years ago. What made the Princess so worthy as to be accepted without such an evaluation?

Was she strongly attuned to the Force? Zev didn't think so. He certainly didn't sense a great amount of power emanating from her aura. She appeared to him and his Force-Sense as any other normal human. Which made him wonder again: why was Ahsoka so eager to see her trained? Especially when Leia wasn't entirely receptive to the idea?

They'd had a few sessions after hypering out of of Ansion, while en route to rendezvous with Home One beyond the galactic rim. Zev tried to teach Leia about clearing her mind and catching the current of the Force. Several grumbling hours later, Leia stood and announced she was giving up before retreating to the isolation of the guest quarters.

Zev took another deep breath and dismissed the doubts. It wasn't his place to question his master's wisdom. He had faith she was making the right decision. If she felt he was ready for this responsibility, then he was, even if he himself did not. Besides, there was too much he didn't yet know. Something else was at work here, and he wouldn't be surprised if the Princess was the focal point of the action.

He exhaled, trying to clear his mind. The Force would reveal things to him in the coming weeks, of that, he was sure. For now, it would be best to stay sharp. To that end, he did a set of push-ups, sit-ups and pull-ups, resourcefully utilizing the ledge that extended over the top of the door frame to his room. His comm rang in the middle of his exercise. He wiped a few beads of sweat from his brow as he picked up the device.

"Hello?" he asked.

"Are we safe to talk?"

Zev set the comm down for a moment then closed the door to his quarters. He unfurled the fold-out console over his roll and accessed the scanners to make sure there were no listening devices active in the docking bay outside. _Home One_ was the Rebel flagship, and supposed to be the ultimate Alliance safe house, yet Zev was beginning to have his doubts. Toprawa was supposed to be a top secret mission-yet the Imps had found out about that. In this day and age, it was impossible to be _too_ safe.

"This is kind of short notice, don't you think?" Zev said back into the comm. "I wasn't planning on hearing back from you for a while. I'm putting you on visual."

He plugged the comm into his console and a holographic projection of Crix Madine appeared. The General's beard looked gruffer and more unkempt than usual.

Zev sat back on his bed. "So what's going on, General?"

"Everything has changed since the last time we spoke. Darth Vader is dead."

Zev blinked. "What?"

"That dogfight over the Death Star at the Battle of Yavin-"

"How?"

"I don't know," Madine said, shaking his head quickly. "Vader was basically separated from us the whole time he was on the Death Star. Not even the 501st went with him there. All I know is what Tarkin told us-which is that Vader flew his own TIE-an advanced model at that-into the dogfight and was shot down."

Zev shook his head. "No, it couldn't have happened that way. All of our fighters were shot down except for one-and according to his debriefing, he saw that special TIE fighter-it hit him several times before he pulled out of his attack run."

"Then Tarkin lied."

"But why?"

"Because he had Vader killed." Madine gave a sardonic grin. "I'd suspected it all along, but this...this confirms it. It had to have happened that way, there's no other explanation."

"No...That doesn't make sense. Why would he do that?" Zev rubbed his forehead, trying to make sense of all the ramifications of these developments. "What else has happened? What haven't you told me yet?"

"A day after-not even a day after, _hours _after, we were summoned to the Death Star for a grand military reception. There was a woman there, some redhead. A Sith."

"Sith? How can you be sure?"

"She had a lightsaber."

Force. If Vader had been killed and there was a new Sith, then... That could only mean one thing: that the Emperor had found an even stronger apprentice to replace Vader with, someone that the Alliance could only expect to be crueler and more destructive-more dangerous. Master Ahsoka needed to be told right away.

"Listen, Zev." Madine was shuffling his fingers together pensively. "Everything has changed for us over here. Our own intel sources have told us that Tarkin has it out for us. He thinks we're dangerous just because we served under Vader."

"The Emperor's new apprentice wants the Military wiped clean of any proof Vader ever existed," Zev said glumly.

Madine nodded.

"Do you need extraction?" Zev was already typing up a request for resources on his tablet. "I can get the brass to organize a rescue operation for you-or I can go through some of my master's mercenary contacts if you want something a little more low key-"

"That won't be necessary."

"What do you mean?" Zev frowned. "I know you've got durasteel nerves, General, to have been reporting from _within _Darth Vader's inner-circle for a year...but don't push your luck. You're in a dangerous situation and you need an out. No one will doubt your bravery for bowing out now."

Madine frowned, then looked to the floor as his eyes began to betray something he'd been hiding since he opened the channel. Zev's Jedi instincts tingled as he felt something amiss.

"General...?"

"Zev, I've reached out to your father."

He twitched almost imperceptibly, his head jerking a couple degrees to his left. Then his eyes went wide like those of an enraged Ansonian bull. "You did _what_?"

"Look, he came to me, alright. He knew-before any of the others did-that we were all scragged by the shift in power. He wanted a way out."

Zev glared at Madine. "And how did he know to go to _you_ for that?"

"If you're asking if I've ever said anything to him before, or done anything to compromise my cover-"

"Or yourself as a source?" Zev shook his head, not registering all of Madine's protests. "If he knew, or had any inkling that you were informing to us, then he and Vader could have set things up to give you disinformation-"

"Damn it, Zev, have I ever given you bad info?"

Zev closed his eyes, not wanting to calm down but recognizing that he had stepped out of place and allowed his anger to do the driving. He shook his head.

"Has my intel ever been anything short of spectacularly useful?"

"No, General, you've always given me good info."

"Then listen to me. I've never done anything to compromise myself, to your father or anyone else." He folded his arms the looked around for a second. "Your father...he just knows me, knows that I've been plagued by guilt and carrying doubts since Dentaal. So he thought I would be sympathetic to his plans to defect."

That could not possibly be true. His father, defecting from the Empire? He hadn't seen the man in eight years or spoken to him in six, but he knew him well enough to say, with almost absolute certainty, that he would never betray the Empire or the grand vision of a New Order that Palpatine had outlined in his commencement speech before the last meeting of the Old Republic Senate twenty years ago. This was a filthy lie. A trick of some kind.

"We called a meeting together. Some of the other officers in Death Squadron, people we were close to. People we could trust."

"Who?" Zev asked.

"Lennox, Kelemann and Needa. Their officers. And we came to an agreement that we would defect together. And all of our men would come with us."

Madine was thoroughly confused by Zev's reaction-or rather, non-reaction-to the news.

"Well?" Madine asked. "Aren't you going to congratulate us? Between us, that's four Star Destroyers, a standing army of ground troops and assault vehicles, several wings of TIEs and a Legion of Stormtroopers, all ready to jump ship to your side of the struggle."

Zev looked up at Madine, his eyes still set in that unrelenting, displeased glare. "Did you tell him about me?"

The General blinked several times then shook his head. "No, Zev. I just told him that I had a contact, not that it was _you_..."

Zev didn't let up. He could see through Bantha poodoo when it was being served right up to him.

"No, I swear-"

"You kriffing son of a nerf!" Zev roared, while punching the wall. "We had one caveat when we made our agreement a year ago. You broke the rules! He knows where I am now, or at least has an idea. Because of _you_."

"Zev-"

"I can't even help you anymore." The disgust in his voice was palpable.

"_What_? The scrag you mean, you 'can't help me?'" Madine paced forward, until only the upper half of his body showed on the projection. "What about the year I've put in working for you? All of those tips? All of those rebel bases, saved from raids. You owe it to me!"

"No! It doesn't work that way. My father doesn't get to just defect and wash his hands clean of everything he's done. You _know_ what he's done, don't you? He's an _evil_ kriff."

"Yeah, and so was I when you recruited me." Madine was poking his finger out accusingly now. "But you said that High Command would overlook that if I worked for you. You said that I could have a place at the table if I provided reliable intel. And you can't reasonably say that I'm any better or worse than your father, so he deserves a chance to be brought in to."

Zev shook his head. "You have _no idea_-none, whatsoever-what he's done to me, how he ruined my life. So don't you damn tell me that he deserves a chance."

The look that formed upon Madine's face middled between astonishment and pity. "Kriffin' P. So it really is just personal between you and him?"

He flushed when he realized just how much of his hand he'd exposed.

"Zev..." Madine sighed. "Come on-you can't let that get in the way. If you have a problem with him, then it's between you and him, you can't...you can't hang me out to dry for that."

"Crix." Zev's jaw set into an implacable clench. "Until I have murdered children, unleashed plagues on unsuspecting civilian populations or taken my marching orders from Darth Vader, you can't tell me anything."

Madine's expression hardened again and he tried to protest but Zev just wouldn't hear it.

"I'll forward your request to the brass," he said, turning away while he scratched his forehead. "Let them decide if they want to take you in or not. I owe you that much, I can't lie. But after that...You and I, we're done."

* * *

><p>Princess Leia Organa was sitting in a booth in the <em>Flying Khasva<em> lounge aboard Admiral Ackbar's _Home One_ MC80 Star Cruiser. She bit her lip as she gazed at the swirl of lights that was the galaxy in the distance. She was finally coming to understand the true ramifications of Alderaan's destruction.

The murder of Leia's father had been a shattering blow to the Alliance's leadership. Mon Mothma and Garm Bel Iblis were the two most important leaders within the Alliance hierarchy and they hated each other. With Bail Organa gone, no one was there to mediate their arguments. To make matters worse, the ministers of supply, finance and industry were all killed on Yavin 4, further reducing the number of mediating voices in the Advisory Council. As much as Leia tried, she could not temper the animosity between Mon Mothma and Garm, which came to a head when the Toprawa became the subject of discussion.

Garm brought it up brusquely, annoyed after being constantly passed over by some of Mon Mothma's new appointees. According to him and his forceful, direct insults, the chair had failed to recognize him on four separate occasions during the meeting. He accused Mothma of trying to push him aside and assert complete control over the Alliance now that Bail Organa and most of the Alderaanian delegation was out of the picture. Some of the Chandrilans in Mon Mothma's camp countered with insults about Corellian crudeness, insults which Garm returned in kind.

The chaos that ensued took a dozen guards to calm, as the Corellian delegation, situated and the Chandrilans ran for each other, sandwiching the Sullustans, the Duros and the Mon Calamari between them. Admiral Ackbar, who was standing in as a temporary chair person since the last was killed on Yavin 4, banged his gavel thirty-seven times before the brawl was broken up and order was restored.

After that, Garm was given back the floor and allowed to ask his original question unmolested: who was responsible for the information leak that caused mission on Toprawa to go sideways? The mission to steal the Death Star plans was a closely guarded secret, yet Garm reasoned that word must have gotten out somehow because that is the only way that the Imperials could have discovered the robbery in progress. Fifty-seven commandos, most of them Corellian, died in the mission, including Corellian Resistance hero Bria Tharen. Only the Jedi Ahsoka Tano and a handful of commandos she could fit into her freighter survived a last-minute, cobbled-together extraction mission.

When he ceded the floor, Mon Mothma stood and said that there was no proof of any kind of information leak. Any number of things could have gone wrong and led to the strike team's discovery during the mission. A guard patrol's time table could have been advanced. There could have been an equipment malfunction or poor scouting intel on the part of the advance team.

Garm took her words for the slight that it was: the advance scouting team was composed entirely of his finest commandos, men who had served him with distinction for years. He stood, without allowing her to finish and began insulting Mon Mothma's judgment. He roared that the leak had to be from within her camp and that she was using her transparent arguments to protect the unreliable people that would protect her when push came to shove. Leia quickly jumped into the fray to defend her mentor from Garm's attacks at which point the Corellian revealed his true fear: that Mon Mothma was consolidating power to fashion herself as dictator of the Alliance.

The Chandrilan delegation starting yelling insults at the Corellians and Admiral Ackbar started banging his gavel again, but it was no use. Order would never be restored in the Advisory Council chamber again. As fists started to fly and the Duros and Mon Cals and Sullustans shuffled out of the way, Garm declared loudly over the fray that he would "rather eat Hutt excrement and ask for seconds before seeing any more Corellian blood spilled so that the Queen of Chandrila might have a chance at taking Palpatine's throne." Then the Corellian leader shuffled out of the chamber, punching and shoving Chandrilans that got in his way.

Once he and his followers were gone, Ackbar sighed and declared the meeting adjourned. He said they would reconcile once Garm had "cooled off." Despite Ackbar's optimism, Leia knew that the differences between Garm and Mon Mothma-and Chandrila and Corellia as a whole-were irreconcilable. The Alliance that her father had worked so hard to forge was coming undone.

Leia sighed and turned back to the transparisteel view port her booth was positioned in front of and tried to clear her mind as she gazed out to the field of stars. These politics put such a horrible burden on her shoulders. It was difficult enough sleeping at night, with that nightmare recurring every other night. Facing the possibility that her father's work could be despoiled by such pettiness was...unfathomable. It was awful enough to think that Father could have died in vain, but if things continued along this path, then even his life's work would have been for naught. If the Rebel Alliance imploded here, then the Empire's tyrannical hand would continue to squeeze the galaxy, undaunted and unpunished.

She turned away from the transparisteel window as a charming orange astromech wheeled by, whistling and beeping at her as it did. Her heart felt heavy as she remembered _her_ astromech droid, R2-D2, and its new owner.

_Luke_. She hadn't allowed herself to think of him in a while. Could he have survived that battle? Even if the Empire didn't shoot him down, it was likely they captured him, then tortured him for information then condemned him to prison mine in Kessel. Her expression warped at the thought and she once again felt guilty for having a free card to escape the massacre at Yavin 4.

"Something wrong, Your Majesty?" Zev asked as he walked by.

She looked up at him. Of course he would be here. That orange astromech was his, after all. "Just...thinking of Yavin," she said after a long silence.

"Don't worry, we'll bounce back," Zev said. "I've been with the Rebellion a long time and we've recovered from some pretty bad situations."

She only gave a hollow smile. If only he'd been in the cabinet chambers with her and seen the extent of the meltdown. Perhaps he wouldn't be so enthusiastic, then.

"I'm surprised you're still here, to be honest," Leia said.

He frowned. "Why? Why shouldn't I be here?"

"Didn't you join with the Corellians? I'm not sure if you've heard about the Advisory Council meeting, but they're all long gone now."

"My place is with the alliance." He smiled. "Mind if I join you?"

"Not at all," she said. She suddenly felt conscious of the distance she'd always kept while around him. He'd saved her life on Ansion and offered to teach her some of the secrets of the Jedi. She owed it to him to be more open and courteous. "How long have you been with the Rebellion?"

"Two years," Zev said. "If you count my time with the Corellian resistance, then eight. I joined after I got out of the Imperial Youth."

"_You_ were in the Imperial Youth?"

He gave a heavy nod. "My father forced me to join. And I've been...fighting against my father my whole life. I guess he's part of the reason why I joined the Rebellion in the first place."

Leia nodded, feeling badly within. What a hard, horrible life he must have had as a child. Zev's father must have been some kind of hardcore loyalist. Only crazies like that sent their children to the Imperial Youth.

Leia began, "who is he?"

Zev grinned. "Are you interrogating me now?"

She shrugged. "Well, I think it's only fair. After all, I'm famous and you're an intelligence officer, so its safe to presume that you already know my life story..."

"I only study famous people whose lives fall into the range of my work."

"But I'm part of your assignment now, aren't I?"

He nodded. "Master Ahsoka told me to look after you."

She sighed deeply.

Zev frowned. "Don't like Master Ahsoka much?"

"I don't know."

Honestly, Leia didn't like her at all. In fact, despite the way Father used to speak so highly of the Jedi, she felt disinclined to trust them. How could you trust anyone that could move objects with a simple gesture or deflect blaster fire with a laser sword? The power they wielded was _frightening_. Whenever she thought of it, Leia was quick to remind herself that those were the same powers that Vader wielded.

Then of course, there was the fact that Ahsoka was connected to a past that the Princess wanted nothing to do with.

"How long have you known her?" Leia asked.

"I've known and reported to her ever since I joined," Zev said. "She's a great patriot and a powerful Jedi. One of the greatest assets our Alliance has, if you ask me."

She'd made several inquiries into Ahsoka's background after returning. The Jedi had a reputation of pursuing her own objectives, of going AWOL for extended periods of time and for spending exorbitant amounts of Alliance money on satisfying her cadre of (mostly Corellian) mercenaries. Not exactly a stellar record.

Leia shrugged. "If you say so."

"Well, my perspective is a little biased," Zev said. "She has been my teacher for eight years."

She glanced back at the field of white dots against black space and felt a spur of curiosity surface, urging her to pursue something Ahsoka had said on Ansion. "How long did it take you to learn?" Leia asked.

"I'm still learning. The process never stops." Zev leaned back in his seat. "But I guess you could say my development in the Force plateaued about a year ago."

"Can you..."

"Move things with my mind? Force choke people? Deflect blaster bolts?"

Leia blinked, barely resisting the instinct to flinch as if slapped.

"No, fortunately," he said, tone low, but playfully mischievous. "I don't think the galaxy would be a safe place if I could."

Leia turned away, at once embarrassed by the way he threw all of her thoughts and musings right back at her. Was that, too a power of the Jedi?

"Forgive me," Zev said, starting to redden a little with embarrassment. "That was a little...impolite."

"I didn't realize I had such a weak mind," Leia said.

"On the contrary, you have a very strong mind," he replied. "You just happened to be thinking loudly at that moment, that's all. I could teach you to shroud your thoughts."

She looked back at him as she felt the answer to her question unfold. A path to the training that Ahsoka had, for whatever reason, denied her, manifested. "Would you give me another chance, to learn what Ahsoka taught you?"

A long silence followed, during which Zev said nothing. He only gazed at her intently, analyzing her with his intense, watchful eyes.

"I could," he said, his voice trailing off. "But would you be willing to leave this?"

Her frown deepened. "What?"

"This." Zev gestured to the lounge, to the other rebels seated and talking, then to the transparisteel window and to the handful of other cruisers in formation. "All of this."

"Leave the rebellion?" Leia grasped. "Of course not! _Why_ would you ask me that?"

"Becoming a Jedi requires the deepest commitment."

"But you serve the Alliance," Leia said, confused. She searched her mind for something Mon Mothma had told her just the other day. "You're one of the best agents we have."

"My duties to the Jedi Order always come first."

"So that's it for you, then?" Her voice assumed a tone. "You don't care about the Alliance? You're just here because of what your Jedi Order has instructed you to do?"

Zev gave an acrid smile. "The Jedi path is also one of moderation. We do not deal in extremes or absolutes."

"So I guess you won't be teaching me, then?"

"Maybe," Zev said. "When you're ready."

The Princess sighed bitterly. "That's exactly what Ahsoka told me. And she didn't explain what that meant."

"With all due respect, Majesty," Zev began, "you're a bit headstrong. Walking the Jedi path requires a patience that neither of us have seen in you. You'll have to learn that before you can learn anything else."

She gave a dejected nod. "Is that all you came to tell me?"

His lips spread in a grin. "Majesty, you're the one who started interrogating me as soon as I approached."

"Then what _has_ happened?"

"I'm here for two reasons. Firstly, I'm here to fulfill my master's mandate. Master Ahsoka commanded me to protect you."

She gestured to everything around them. "We're on _Home One_, one of the safest places a Rebel Official can be..."

Zev sighed. "You didn't let me finish."

"Oh." She rolled her eyes. "_I'm_ _sorry_, go on."

"A decree has also come down, direct from the Chief of State's office."

So quickly? That Advisory Council meeting had turned inside-out just four hours ago. How could Mon Mothma have made a decree so soon? "What is it?"

"Until the Alliance military recovers from the huge losses at Yavin, all meetings of the Advisory Council are to be suspended."

A shiver traced up her spine. "What?"

"All delegates of the advisory council are to be sequestered, to ensure the future viability of the Alliance's civilian government." Zev leaned forward candidly, hands hands folded on the table. "In case you think you're special, all delegates means _all_ delegates. After I debriefed the Chief of State, she recommended that I fulfill my master's mandate, seeing as how it coincided with her own."

Great. Now even Mon Mothma was trying to stick her with a Jedi bodyguard. Contrary to popular belief, she did not need to have her hand held at all times, she did not need protection twenty-four seven and she certainly was not as brittle as she appeared.

"Did she give you a writ remanding me to your custody, too?" Leia quipped. "Or is this supposed to be as off the books as her suspension of the Advisory Council?"

"Come on now, Your Majesty, don't be upset with the Chief, she only cares for your safety."

"Where are we going then?" She asked while thrumming her fingers against the table.

"There's a lot of places we can hide, but one in particular that stands out," Zev said as he rose from the table. "Have you ever heard of a planet called Naboo? I have a good friend who lives there. Her name is Pooja Naberrie, and she just cannot wait to meet you."


	8. Chapter 6

The flashes of light from the angry sky were muted to him, entering his helmet through those cursed fish-eyed goggles. His eyes were closed, and while so much of him was no longer human, that was. Light still appeared to be red flashes behind closed eyelids.

Flashes of lightning were accompanied by the constant _drip-drip-drip_ of rain falling on his durasteel helmet. Above the constant noise of the storm and sloshing of footsteps through muddy banks, Vader could barely make out the slurred, quick speech of his captors. Even if he was energized enough to tune in and listen-and he wasn't-he would not be able to understand them anyways.

They spoke a most peculiar dialect, that seemed to consist of rushed syllables and clicks jammed between hard, nasal consonant sounds. There was something extremely barbaric about these strange red men that had descended upon him after he crashed his TIE/x1. Their appearance was even stranger: they had short tendrils that drooped down from their cheekbones, faces that were long but sunken in at the mouth, red skins the color of rich clay and eyes that appeared as yellow and feral as Palpatine's. They carried weapons made of sticks and rocks and dressed in clothing seemed to be made from bark fibers, fastened by the long, sinewy stems of some forest ferns.

With such primitive weapons there was no way they should have been able to subdue a Sith Lord, but when they appeared in numbers, a band of ten in total-seven men and three women-they had caught him off-guard and exhausted from using the Force to stabilize his landing. These creatures had another advantage on their side: the Force was with them. They used it to overpower him, to pluck the lightsaber from his hands, to knock him to his feet and eventually bind his robotic limbs together.

That was hours...no, _days _ago. He had been drifting in and out of consciousness ever since, as the red men carried him through the forest, over some rocky hills and into a bog that seemed to get deeper and danker the further they went. Vader was not so much concerned about where there were taking him as he was curious. These red men might have had the Force on their side but they were fools if they thought they could hold him forever. No matter how strong they were in the Force, it was unlikely that they would overcome him.

After all, he had massacred an entire temple of Jedi in his youth. His prime. Vader frowned beneath the mask-an expression that, like most any other movement of any still-human parts of his body, caused immense pain but he could not help but doing from time to time. His prime was more than twenty years ago, before Obi-Wan Kenobi and Siri Tachi had reduced him to living in this walking prison cell. Before he needed a ventilator pump pressurized air into his scarred lungs.

Another bright flash in the distance illuminated the shape of the terrain to come. Gnarled trees formed a bleak landscape of a swamp valley, flooded by a dark river that cut in from the wooded foothills to the north. Those prominent gnarled trees had twisted trunks and misshapen, leafless branches that tendrilled out to the sky in an expression of enduring pain. The trees had exposed roots that seemed to misdirect the flow of the river into black, stagnant pools.

They entered the swamp, sloshing about until they were waist-deep in the water. Some twenty minutes later, Vader caught sight of what seemed to be their encampment: a cluster of half a dozen tents, all made from branches and the same bark-fiber cloth, situated under a trio of barren gnarled trees ten to fifteen meters in height. There were several totems placed in the ground at the entrance to the camp, each one engraved with figures that resembled red men and hieroglyphs that seemed eerily familiar.

As they trudged out of the water and onto the islet of the camp, another red man emerged from the largest tent. He was much older than the others, with sagging, wrinkled skin about the arms, chin and forehead and cheek-tendrils that drooped down past his jaw. He was dressed in black robes far finer than the bark-fiber dress that kinsmen he wore and he carried a gnarled staff, covered with hieroglyphs printed from red dyes.

The four red men that had been carrying him tossed him onto the ground before the elder. Vader fell onto his knees and forearms, then staggered up, his soaked armorweave cloak draping before his arms and body. The ten hunters that had brought him in all spoke to the elder with their bizarre language, making foreign gestures to Vader as they spoke. The leader of the hunters-Vader presumed he was, since he wore a cloak none of the others had-handed the elder Vader's lightsaber.

Vader turned his attention to the elder of the red men, whose posture was hunched over and he used his right hand to support himself on his gnarled staff while examining Vader's weapon with the other. He looked frail and broken and could have been a hundred or more years old, much further beyond his prime than Vader was...but then Vader looked into his eyes, which were alive with a feral yellow-red glow and was immediately reminded of the Emperor. Appearances could be all too deceiving. Anything was possible through the power of the Force.

The elder spoke for the first time since their arrival and the others fell to silence immediately, all of them shrinking before his voice. His words had a curious effect upon them, as though he wasn't just giving them orders, but commanding them, as one would command a droid. They all seemed to collectively relax as he went on a tangent of hisses and clicks. All ten of the hunters walked to the tents, laid down and closed their eyes.

Then the elder glanced up at him for a moment and Vader felt a flash of power-the true power, not just the ominous feeling of coiled potential, but unbridled wrath and fury. The Force-the Dark Side-was unleashed in this place. The red men, the hunters, they had their own powers but all of it flowed from the elder. They were his apprentices...no, not apprentices. An apprentice serves his master, derives some of his strength from his master, but he maintains a certain degree of autonomy. These were not students or apprentices. Those were his _slaves_.

The Sith Lord suddenly felt apprehensive as the elder paced towards him. Would he be able to overpower this creature if it was hostile? The elder stopped within a meter of the Sith, then folded his hands over his staff and stared directly into Vader's lenses.

_ITwasFORETOLDyouwouldcomehere._

Vader almost staggered back at the burst of telepathy. The voice boomed in his head and seemed to come from everywhere at once; an overwhelmingly powerful display from this creature of the Dark Side.

_I_know_whoyouARECHOSENONE._

Vader frowned. That was a phrase he had not heard in a long, long time.

_Anakinskywalker! . ._

"Who are you?" Vader asked.

_._

Was this elder powerful, omniscient or merely insane? Vader couldn't tell. But those eyes...those eyes of his waxed full with the power of the Dark Side.

_YOUWEREBROUGHTHEREFORAREASON,ANAKIN. SKYWALKER,SONOFSHMI,PADAWANOFKENOBI,APPRENTICEOFSIDIOUS. . withYOURreturn,ourVIGILends._

"...what?"

The elder raised a hand and a floodgate of energy was released. A force that could only be described as a hurricane wind slammed into Vader head-on, knocking him off his feet and sweeping him back into one of the stagnant black pools that had formed at the base of the gnarled tree. The invisible hand of the elder red man forced him down into the black liquid, which was thick and viscous and seemed to move on its own, carrying in it's putrid mixture all the bile and corruption of the swamp. Vader struggled against it, mechanical limbs flailing, armorweave cloak fluttering in the black water as the flashes of lightning above grew darker and darker.

_WEhavewatchedYOUforaLONGTIME. INthenameofourlordmaster,THEWISE,wehavewatchedyou._

Vader flailed and flailed, trying to find a rock, an outcrop, an exposed root-anything-that he could use to climb out of this mire. It was no use. The elder was too strong. His invisible hand overpowered the mechanized limbs which were strong enough to bend tritanium and crush durasteel. Vader felt the elder's power begin to manifest in different ways-a slight pressure on his temples, a caress that seemed to dull his nerves and coax him into a lower level of consciousness.

Visions...memories came streaming out of his mind in painful bursts. They appeared to him more like dreams than memories, scenes from a life lived so, so long ago.

_._

The glow of deep violet light was suddenly struck away by a flash of blue. A severed hand, lightsaber and all, fell into the open window. The cowardly whimpering of a defeated politician became the triumphant roar of a Dark Lord.

_"Power! _Unlimited_ power!"_

Lightning flashed again, as it was flashing now, and the blue light retreated, yielding to sheer horror of the moment. Mace Windu, a warrior too gallant and skilled to suffer such an ignoble death, fell a thousand stories, stabbed in the back by one he had counted as his own.

Then, the darkness' embrace eclipsed all reason. The pact was sealed. Anakin Skywalker became Yan Dooku's successor.

_. hisPRIDEwillBEhisDOWNFALL._

Vader wasn't struggling anymore. He wasn't even moving. His body, suit and all simply slumped back as he sunk further and further into the sinkhole. His mind traveled as the Force reached up from the bottom of that black well and embraced him, taking him from the hand of the elder above.

_SPEAKWITHTHEFORCE. SPEAKWITHDESTINY._

There were blurs of places he had been before.

The sand of Tatooine stung his skin as he raised his tiny arms up to guard against it. The wind was kicking it up and the kriffing stuff was getting everywhere. A storm was coming and Wattoo would beat him red if he didn't get all of the droids in on time.

More sand, so much like Tatooine, but from an entirely different world. It got into his robes as he rolled on it, dodging blasterfire from a dozen different battle droids. The Jedi that were his brothers and sisters fought by his side as Geonosians flapped over head, occasionally shooting at them with those bizarre sonic cannons of theirs.

Sand...again? But wet. From what? Water, of course, but where? Was it a beach? On a lake? A lake that seemed so familiar and felt so reassuring, even though he _hated_ sand? Of course, it was her, her voice trailed off in the distance, too far, too far for him to reach.

_Padmé? Padmé, where are you? Oh, Force, I'm so sorry for choking you!_

This time, it didn't get in between his fingers or his toes. He didn't have any left. Just a mechanical arm that clawed at the sand on the banks of the molten river, desperately trying to climb up and away from the fire that threatened to light his stumps on fire. Above, on the high ground, Siri and Obi-Wan towered, blue and purple lightsabers in hand. Victory buzzed from their blades. Their position was unassailable.

Moments later, Ahsoka came running out, her eyes flooded with tears, expression horrified by what she saw. Siri had to grab her to stop her from running down the embankment. She fell to her knees then shoved her surrogate master away, while screaming profanities-Huttese profanities, which he had long ago taught her as a joke. Obi-Wan tried to turn her away, but she refused.

She kept looking down at him, tears running from her eyes as the lava caught his stubs and the flame crawled up his cloak and consumed him. And the sand that he had been digging his mechanical hand in became glass.

It all blurred together, a vortex of images and memories and all the emotions they evoked. So many faces-Obi-Wan, Siri, Mace, Ahsoka...and her face, her face above all.

Padmé.

There she was standing before him. He had no perspective of exactly where he was-or rather, where they were, but she she was in front of him. She wasn't pregnant anymore but she was wearing the same blue gown they'd dressed her in at her funeral. He wasn't there of course, but he'd seen the pictures. Her hair fell to her shoulders in gorgeous chocolate curls. Force, she was so was beautiful. More beautiful than he had ever remembered.

"Padmé?" He whispered. "Is that you?"

"Anakin?" A smile instantly appeared on her face, then disappeared as quickly, smothered by fear. "No, no, it's _you_."

"Padmé!" He called after her as she turned to run. "It's me, your husband!"

"Liar," She roared over her shoulder, "You murdered my husband!"

He ran after her, and the white blur that surrounded him suddenly began to take a form and became a place he recognized. The hall of mirrors in Imperial Palace on Coruscant...the place he hated most in a place he already abhorred, because it was so intricately connected with his master.

Vader stopped and saw the hundred reflections that filled him with dread. Even here, in this ephemeral retreat of the Force, he was a monster in obsidian armor. He turned around and saw it again. It was everywhere-it surrounded him. This monstrosity that Obi-Wan and Palpatine had collaborated in making him. So he ran, ran from the image that flanked him on both sides, ran until he reached the end of the hallway and entered that audience chamber that had come to signify his slavery to Palpatine.

As usual, it was filled with courtiers and nobles and royal sycophants-important people who were all so faceless and empty and insignificant. This massive chamber had only one true occupant. Amidst the audience of a thousand, he felt only the malice of one. Palpatine stood next to his throne, back to the rest of the chamber as he looked down at the city world he lorded over.

"What is the code of the Sith, my friend?"

Vader gritted his teeth as he recalled the verse that Sidious refused to completely explain.

"The Force shall set me free," Vader said.

Of course, Vader had been a slave all his life. First to Gardullah, then to Watto, then to the Jedi Order and lastly to Palpatine. How could he have possibly understood that tenet? What could he have known of freedom? About as much as a fish knew of flying, perhaps.

But there was power in those words, even if he didn't understand them. They were true, so true, even if he had never realized it before. Palpatine had never had the power to hold him. Palpatine held him because he submitted willingly. The Force was always there. It's true power, always evident. He was free. He could have always been free.

He turned from the throne and caught sight of her again. A beautiful face in a crowd of the faceless. She turned to run. He ran after her. And all their surroundings started to blur to white again, until the settings took another shape, a form he recognized from so many years ago.

Varykino. Her room, up in the spires, decorated with trinkets from her childhood, book cases and shelves filled with materials on Nabooian history and government. On the bed she was sitting, holding a picture frame to her chest as she stared out the window.

Vader took a step toward her then stopped. Something about this wasn't right. He felt heavy and confused. The air here was stale, like that of a tomb. She turned to him and he felt as though she was shredding him with her eyes, which were so wet and swollen with tears. She hugged her picture frame against her chest.

"You murdered my husband," she hissed.

"No, Padmé, I _am_ your husband."

"Monster!"

"Padmé!" He took a step toward her and she scurried across the bed and grabbed the knife that lay on the table on the other side and pointed it at him. Even that little blade, he recognized. It was what he had used to carve the japor snippet he'd made for her all those years ago. It was only in the silence that followed that he recognized the sound of his mechanical breathing.

"You choked me," she said, shaking her head. She was still holding the picture frame to her chest. "You took me away from him."

"Who?" Vader frowned. "Anakin? That's me, Padmé, _I'm_ here now!"

She closed her eyes. More tears streamed down her face. "Anakin was already dead by then. But you...you took me away from him. We had a son!"

She lowered the picture frame from her chest, then turned it so he could see. If he could have gasped, he would have.

"He's so beautiful," Padmé said between sniffles. "He looks so much like his father. Obi-Wan was going to train him, you know. Teach him the ways of the Force."

Vader was shaking his head. "It can't be."

"What can't be?" Padmé said angrily. "Anakin and I had a son. And I...I didn't even get to hold him or kiss him, or make the galaxy he would live in a better place. All because of _you_."

The words pierced his thorax and ripped out his guts. He had a son!

No. Anakin had a son.

A son that had his same dark blond hair and blue eyes and dimpled chin. How could he have not seen it before? Was he so blinded by his hatred for Kenobi, so eager to get his revenge that he couldn't have noticed his own progeny racing out of the cargo bay while taking pot shots at him?

"And you tried to kill him too," Padmé hissed.

The words made him sick to his stomach. "No..." He looked up at his wife and shook his head, begging her pardons a thousand times over. "No. I didn't know. Padmé, I swear-"

"Get out," she growled.

"I didn't know! I'll fix things-"

"Get out!"

"I'll find him, Padmé! I'll take him in. Train him. Make him into the man you would have always wanted him to be, I promise!"

"GET OUT!"

She lunged across the bed, swinging the wood carving knife. But before it could cut through the electrical panels over his abdomen, he was woke from the trance and was back at the bottom of the sinkhole. The Force coiled through his veins, empowering him with such a might he hadn't felt since...since before he'd lost him arm on Geonosis.

A flash of lightning overhead filled the sinkhole with a moment of light and Vader propelled himself upwards, the water swooshing past his helmet, until he broke through the surface and rolled onto the ground. He pulled his cloak back, thick and heavy it was with the filthy dark water and stood up as the elder approached him, staff in hand.

_didyoufindyourDESTINY,CHOSENONE?_

"Yes," Vader said with a nod, "yes I did."

Then he grabbed the elder by the throat and ripped it out with one swift motion. The man fell to his knees, gasping for air as deep, orange blood gushed from the gap in his neck.

The hunters immediately woke. When they saw what had happened to their master, they turned and ran into the swamp. Vader followed them with his eyes until they disappeared, then he turned his head upward and looked at the sky which was flashing with lightning every few seconds.

He suddenly felt compelled to remove the mask and helmet.

Without caution or hesitation, he placed both hands around the helmet, taking it off with little effort. There was a click of depressurization when he removed the mask. The Sith Lord gasped relentlessly, struggling to breathe the non-pressurized air. But he heedlessly cast the mask and helmet aside, knowing he could survive without them for at least two minutes.

He craned his dark yellow eyes skyward once again and stretched out his arms while unclenching his fists, turning his palms to the heavens above. For the first time in his life, Darth Vader _felt_ raindrops on his face.

It was...overwhelming. The Force had set him free indeed.


	9. Chapter 7

Shira's mind was filled with flashes of anguish and pain. What was the source? Was it her master? She could not be sure. She wasn't even conscious. The screams entered her mind while she dreamed. And her body responded. Her teeth gnashed, her torso twisted, her fists clenched. A few times she even cried out, her voice echoing through the woods until it woke Luke.

Luke approached her curiously, his eyes still heavy with sleep. He whispered her name a few times, trying to wake her from her nightmare. When she slept through that, he started saying her name louder and snapped his fingers in front of her face. She slept through that, too. So he made one more attempt-he grabbed her by the shoulder and shook her gently.

That woke Shira instantly. Her eyes were open, wide with a mixture of outrage and alarm as she grabbed his wrist with one hand and his shirt with the other. She yanked him down and slammed her elbow into this collar bone, then rolled until she had him pinned to the soil, her elbow riding up into his throat.

"Shira!" He coughed. "Relax! Shira, it's me!"

Her eyes were still wide with feral panic. "What the hell is your problem?"

"You...you were screaming in your sleep."

"Did I give you permission?" She barked.

"What?"

"Did I give you permission to touch me?"

He only stared back at her, a bewildered look on his face as he slowly shook his head. She let him go, and finger-combed back a few loose strands of red hair. Her heart rate was out of control and judging from the heat she felt when she wiped her brow, her face was more than a little flush.

"Hey," he said as he sat up. "I'm sorry-"

She waved him off. "I overreacted."

She did. But it's easy to forget that sleep is when the body was most vulnerable. And though Luke appeared to be nothing more than a clueless farm boy, innocent and green and still carrying the stink of the provinces on him, she could never be certain of what intentions or motives or desires lurked beneath. She certainly didn't want to be hurt again.

He leaned back against the trunk of the densely-leafed tree they had camped under and rubbed his collar bone. "Are you alright?"

Great. Vader was set to take Luke in as another apprentice, and now Luke had this perception of her as a brittle girl with personal space issues. She had just shown all kinds of weakness to him and he was set to become her new rival. She shook her head.

"Yeah," she said. "I just had a vision. My master is near, and he is in pain. And..."

She stopped as she felt her master's presence in the breeze. The cross wind seemed to carry his voice. Shira turned from their campsite and paced down a slight incline to the forest, looking for signs of him. R2-D2, Luke's Astromech, sat several meters away, working as a sentry while Shira and Luke slept. The feeling that she always associated with her master's presence coincided with the droid waking and letting off a long string of whistles and beeps. Shira made out a dark shape in the woods as one of R2's blue top panels were folded up and a silver arm poked out at the approaching figure.

"Now, now, little one," a deep, raspy voice said between this _hiss-click_ of a respirator, "you wouldn't want to harm your old master, would you?"

R2 gave a more approving beep and withdrew his weapon.

"Hey, what's going on down there?" Luke asked.

Shira ignored him and walked down the slight incline, to where her Vader stood with the astromech droid. She bent the knee before him, bowing so deep that strands of her hair touched the sticky wet soil. She would have bowed deeper if it was possible or practical.

"You've done well," Vader said. "Now, our ascent is inevitable. There is little that the Palpatine or Jade can do to stop us."

Vader had been planning to overthrow and replace Palpatine since he had taken her in as his student and apprentice. She was his first co-conspirator in this plot and she had been helping him to lay the groundwork for a revolution for ten years. She looked forward to ruling together, to re-making this Empire into something more orderly and more equitable. And though her master certainly had a cruel edge, one she had learned to fear over the years, he had always been sensible and fair in applying it.

"The rest of the pieces will fall into place soon, Shira," he said.

A smile formed on her lips. He had a way of maintaining a very conscious distance from her, and speaking her given name so rarely was part of that distance. When he did say her name, he spoke it as though it were a reward in of itself. A verbal pat on the back, so to speak.

Her master was more machine than man, with a face that was forever hidden by a durasteel mask. Because of that, he was like no other man in that he had no interest-perhaps no capability, after all, it was hard to say just how human he was beneath that black suit. That was why she reserved exclusively for him the deepest of respects, one that she was incapable of giving to anyone else.

And he deserved. He commanded her absolute, unerring loyalty for a reason: he had found her amongst the squalor of the Tarisian undercity; he had shown her her true potential; he had transformed her from the pathetic, hollow shell she was then into the powerful Sith warrior she was now. Nevermind Talesan Fry. Vader was her real father.

"Master, I am so glad to see you are well," she said to his feet. "I thought-I feared-that you might have been...damaged."

"I was captured for a while, by some of the wild men that live on this primitive moon, but I am better for it," Vader said. He reached down and lifted her chin, until her head was craned up to look into his black mask. "You don't have to worry about me, Shira."

"Shira!" Luke called. "What's going on down there? Where-"

Vader looked up and Shira turned around. Luke was standing on the ridge, mouth agape, expression horrified by what he saw. Shira rose to her feet slowly, then gestured to the Sith that stood beside her.

"This is my master," she said to him, "Lord Vader."

Luke blinked once, then turned to run.

* * *

><p>Luke panted as he ran through the forest. He had no clue where he was going. In fact, he could barely <em>see<em> where he was going. It was still the middle of the night and the sky was cloudy and starless. All he knew was that Shira's master was Ben's murderer and that if he didn't run as fast as he could, he would end up like Ben did.

There was a flash of lightning overhead, followed moments later by the crash of thunder. It produced just enough light to illuminate the jungle floor, to give Luke a glimpse of the rocks, exposed roots and other obstacles in his path, and a look at the dark figure that loomed before him.

Going from full run to all stop caused him to skid and almost fall back as his boots sloshed through sticky mud. Luke fell back on one hand while grasping for his blaster with the other. In a haze of panic, he raised the weapon and started squeezing shots in Vader's general direction. Many of his shots missed. Others, the black figure dismissed with his gloved hand.

But he didn't stop. He refused to. Even after the power charge completely drained, he continued to squeeze as if sheer will power could somehow banish the Sith Lord.

Darth Vader took a step forward and made a gesture with his other hand. An invisible force pried Luke's fingers from the blaster handle and yanked the weapon away. It gravitated to Vader's hand, where he effortlessly crushed it into a chunk of scrap metal then tossed it aside.

The panic transfused into sheer horror as he scrambled to his feet. A flush of adrenaline overwhelmed his pain and he rounded the massive tree trunk, breaking to a full run deeper into the jungle. He ran for several minutes until something grasped his ankles and caused him to tumble into a tangle of exposed tree roots. He wailed in pain as his scalp scraped against fragments of tree bark.

"Has Obi-Wan stooped so low?" That deep, raspy voice mused. "To take on a boy unable to control his own fear?"

Without pausing or thinking, he scrambled to his feet again. The sound of that maddening ventilator seemed to surround him as he broke off into another frantic run. He made only three strides before colliding with that menacing black suit and falling flat on his back.

"Fightme, _coward_," the Sith Lord roared.

Luke crawled away. Another flash of lightning illuminated the scene and the other weapon hanging from his belt glinted in the darkness. Luke glanced at it, then hesitated, looking back at the armored menace that towered over him.

A tense moment passed before Luke reached for his father's weapon with his left hand and made a desperate lunge for the Sith Lord.

Darth Vader stepped back. The azure blade only caught humid jungle air.

Luke extended his right hand backward to stabilize himself as his twisting momentum followed through. Then popped up to his feet and stood at guard, both hands on the hilt of the sword.

He had never handled the weapon like this before, but somehow it felt natural.

Vader clapped his hands mockingly. "Good. There is still hope for you yet."

Luke knew that he was over matched, knew that he had no chance. The Sith Lord was a true swordsman, who had trained for years. But he had no choice, so he lunged forward again. This time Darth Vader intercepted, blocking with his crimson saber.

Luke drew his blade back and swung, attacking with mad, dogged effort. There was no discipline in his attacks, no form or movement to indicate any real training. Clumsy and sloppy, he attacked moved with utmost simplicity-left to right, up and down, occasionally varying with diagonal slices.

"I sense a great deal of turmoil within you, young one," Vader said. "But you _are_ powerful enough to be Kenobi's apprentice."

"Don't you even say his name!" Luke shouted. "You _murdered_ him!"

"Murder?" Vader tilted his head as he batted away another one of Luke's attacks. "What do _you_ know about Obi-Wan?"

"I know that he was strong enough to stand against you!"

Luke sprung forward to attack. The Sith Lord nimbly stepped out of the way, then brought his blade around to parry the next attack and pushed Luke back. His heel caught on an exposed root and he fell flat on his back, his father's lightsaber tumbling out of reach as he did. Vader stepped over him and pointed that red lightsaber directly at his face.

"Do you wish to know true power?" Vader asked. "To make the Force bend to your will?"

"If only to destroy you," he spat boldly, not pausing for a second to acknowledge all of the fear he saw in the tip of that crimson blade.

"You have so much hatred. And why?"

Luke balked. "You know why. You know who I am!"

"I do." Vader nodded. "Just as you knew who _I _am. But I do not know your name."

"I am Luke _Skywalker._" He spoke the name proudly, unafraid to identify himself before his father's murderer.

"Ah, so you are Luke Skywalker." Vader paused, then withdrew his weapon.

Luke scowled, confused by the sudden reprieve and sat up as Vader began to pace.

"Yes..." Vader said, "_Luke_ Skywalker. The son of Anakin."

Luke frowned at the simultaneous familiarity and foreignness of the word. "...Anakin?"

"You didn't even know his name?" Vader balked. "Terrible, how much Obi-Wan must have lied to you. How much he must have hidden..."

Luke flushed, then shook his head vigorously. "I don't need your pity!"

"No, no you don't," Vader said. "But you have my understanding. We are not so different, you and I."

"I am _nothing_ like you."

Vader shook his head. "You are so intent on hating me when you know nothing about me."

"I know enough," Luke rebuffed.

"Do you?" Vader asked, an air of amused curiosity in his voice. "All that you know are the lies that Obi-Wan has told you."

Luke stepped forward then stopped. He said, "Jedi don't-"

"Know this about the Jedi," Vader said pointedly, "they are obsessed with control and power. Be thankful that I freed you from Kenobi before he could cast his yoke upon you as he once cast it upon your father."

This, Luke could not take. "You murdered my father!" He shouted, his face twisting with rage.

"I did _not _murder your father!" The trees overhead seemed to shake with each word Vader roared. "How _dare_ you slander me!"

Luke found himself trembling under the deathly gaze of those black lenses and at the severity of the Sith Lord's tone.

"Obi-Wan told you that vicious lie, didn't he?" Vader's voice was wrought with disgust. "How appropriate, considering the fact that you are the only person he had more reason to fear than me. Do you wish to know the real reason behind your father's death?"

Luke just panted and stared at the ground.

"You should know," Vader began, "the Jedi Order sought such absolute control over its members that they severed them from all bonds that might interfere with that control-even their families."

"What?" Luke looked up, suddenly recalling the way Ben had asked him to leave his family.

"The Jedi Order took Force-Sensitive children away from their families when they were infants and never allowed them to contact them."

"But," Luke stammered, losing his resolve, "why?"

"Obi-Wan tried to take you from your family, didn't he?" There was something different about that deep, raspy voice; it was softer, almost...sympathetic.

Luke froze, unable to reply.

"Don't you wonder why he didn't intervene to save Owen and Beru?"

A knee-jerk reaction caused him to scream in protest. "Ben wasn't there!"

"But he knew they were coming," Vader said calmly.

Luke gritted his teeth, not wanting to believe what the Dark Lord was insinuating. "How could he have?"

"Don't be coy with me, young Skywalker," Vader said all while poking out a chastising finger at him. "Obi-Wan knew the stormtroopers were coming before they landed. He knew they were going to kill your aunt and uncle before they even dismounted from their dewbacks. This is the power of the Force. _You_ know this."

Invisible daggers dug into Luke's chest as he remembered seeing his aunt and uncle's charred remains strewn out in front of the razed ruin that had been his lifelong home.

"After all, what are a few Stormtroopers against the awesome power of a Jedi?" The black helmet turned away momentarily, looking to the sky, which was clearing after the recent thunderstorm. "You saw it yourself when we fought aboard the Death Star. Even though old and feeble and cornered, Obi-Wan was still a fearsome warrior. Again, what are a few stormtroopers against that sort of power?

Luke said nothing, but the wounds ached. That loss was still so fresh in his memory, so raw in his heart.

"Obi-Wan did not care for your aunt and uncle. He could have saved your aunt and uncle but he did not. For the same reason he did not save your grandmother from slavery."

"My grandmother was a _slave_?"

"And so was your father," Vader answered evenly, "for a period of time."

"How can _you_ know this?" Luke sneered.

"Anakin was a good friend of mine. A teacher. He removed the blinds from my eyes and showed me the foolishness of the Jedi way." Vader paused. "Of course, Obi-Wan did not tell you that, did he?"

Luke said nothing, knowing that he could _not_ trust Vader.

Vader shook his head. "He only wished to control you," he said. "The Jedi long ago realized that they cannot control the close bonds of personal loyalty, so their restrictions went far beyond banning family. Jedi were not allowed to fall in love, or marry or even have children."

The boy shook his head, trying to banish all of the doubts that were involuntarily rising. "But...but..."

"Ah, yes, if that were so, then how could your existence be explained?" Vader mused. "The Order had to replenish its ranks. So the Jedi were not allowed to have children, but they _were_ allowed to bear them. If Anakin had allowed the Jedi-allowed Obi-Wan-to have their way, then you would have been taken from him at birth, raised in a Temple créche and indoctrinated with the Jedi's primitive views on the Force. You would have never known your father. He never would have been allowed to contact you."

Aghast, Luke shook his head again. "But...but..."

"It seems as though that happened anyway, didn't it?" Vader asked, while folding his arms over his chest. "After all that has happened, what do you truly about your father? What has Obi-Wan told you? Did he show you pictures of him? News casts of the battles he fought in during the Clone Wars? No, he didn't even tell you his name."

Luke scratched his temples as he tried to push down all of the doubts. "Obi-Wan told me the truth. My father was a Jedi. A pilot-"

"Obi-Wan told you want you wanted to hear, because he knew it would be easier to control you. This is the way of the Jedi: they seek to obliterate all of the natural, human passions and feelings to get better control over their people," Vader said. "They had a draconian order, where power only flowed to the top. Only the elders and had access to the most powerful teachings."

The boy shuddered. A feeling of dread came over him.

"Anakin saw the fallacy of it all and went beyond them; he embraced the full spectrum of the Force's power by learning the teachings of the Sith." One of Vader's fists clenched and he raised it mightily to the sky. "With these teachings, he did what the Jedi could not: he ended the Clone Wars. He brought peace to the galaxy. But the Jedi could not tolerate this challenge to their power. That is why Obi-Wan killed your father."

"No," Luke gasped. "It can't be."

"Search your feelings Luke, you know it to be true."

Luke felt it; the power of the Force vacillating all around him, whispering, yet revealing nothing conclusive. He shook his head with ferocious vigor, his anger coming to a thorough broil as he refused to accept the Sith Lord's words.

"That's impossible," he said, his tone rising. "You lie!"

"But he did," Vader said wistfully. He pulled a small holoprojector from his belt. "I recovered this recording from a security droid on Mustafar. There is no audio, so you'll have to bear with visual only. Watch closely."

The image that beamed out of the projector showed two Jedi fought furiously as they floated over a stream of molten lava, one of them on a tiny repulsolift droid and the other on a much larger cargo platform. With their blue lightsabers, they hacked and slashed at each other, often moving faster than Luke's untrained eye could see.

Luke could recognize the one standing on the cargo platform. It was difficult, and it required a little bit of imagination, but somehow, he knew that was a much younger incarnation of Ben Kenobi. The other...the other Jedi was his father. He wasn't sure how he recognized him-he'd never seen a picture of the man-but he did. It was a feeling, a suggestion from the Force perhaps.

Swiftly, Ben leaped from his cargo platform to a low cliff, just above the smoldering bank of the lava river. And Luke's father leaped after him, thrusting himself high in the air...but not high enough.

With a circular slice, Ben cut off Anakin's legs and left arm. Luke gasped, horrified as his father fell onto the river bank. Anakin reached out with his other arm, struggling to pull himself up the hill, but only tumbled down. Obi-Wan's mouth moved, shouting muted words of anger as he knelt down to pick up Anakin's lightsaber.

Luke gazed at his father's weapon as it lay peaceably on the ground, at once horrified by the true circumstances of how it came into his possession. He looked back up at the recording and saw that lava from the river had set fire to what remained of Anakin's legs and swept up his robe. Luke covered his mouth in shock. Tears welled in his eyes as he watched his father be consumed by flame. And Ben, just turned his back, leaving him to burn.

The recording ended and Luke averted his gaze as streams of anguish ran down his cheeks. He remembered the horrified protest he'd made when Vader decapitated the old man on the Death Star and the way he'd grieved the loss aboard Han's _Millennium Falcon_. Of course, he didn't know at the time, and that was the excuse he tried to tell himself now. But it couldn't smooth over the revulsion rising in his stomach. How could he have followed and mourned the same man that had murdered his father?

The sick, unclean, jilted feeling escalated. The legends of the past, the myths he'd renowned and drawn on for strength and set as the very basis of his reality, had just been blasted apart by the superlaser of truth.

Unwilling, but forced to cope with a new reality every bit as cold and harsh as his failure in the Death Star trench, Luke let loose a bereaved scream.

* * *

><p>Luke was taking deep breaths and shuddering. Fresh tears were rolling down his cheeks and the conflict that tore at him from within could not be more apparent. He was defenseless. Vader gleefully saw through him.<p>

The levers to pull and push were all too easy to identify. His feelings were laid bare, to manipulate and exploit. The boy's emotional turmoil was a road map to victory, an instruction manual containing the secrets to earning his trust and in turn, his loyalty.

Vader said, "do you understand the depths of Obi-Wan's deception?"

"I...I don't believe it." Luke said.

"I have wronged you, Luke."

Luke looked up at him, teary-eyed and confused. "What?"

"I robbed you of the opportunity to avenge your father personally. I'm sorry."

There was a long silence that was only interrupted by the gasp of Vader's respirator. After a while, the boy looked up at the Sith Lord. "What do you want from me?"

"You deserved to know the truth."

Luke nodded heavily. "How did you know my father?"

Vader fought the urge to reveal himself as the man that once _was_ Anakin Skywalker. He could not afford to confuse the boy and conflate his goals. Besides, he...he wasn't the boy's father. This was Anakin's son. Padmé's delirious raving had drilled that fact into his mind. Anakin was dead-dead and never to return. Vader would never have the right...

"He was my mentor, as Obi-Wan was his," Vader answered. "We were both raised as Jedi, but your father recognized fallacies in the Jedi Order: their steadfast refusal to learn from their Sith enemy, to embrace the Force in its entirety and use its power to its full potential. He was cunning enough to learn these secrets and in turn, teach them to me. I was his secret apprentice. We were going to destroy the Emperor together-"

Luke's gaze narrowed. "Why didn't that happen?"

"Because of what happened on Mustafar!" Vader's fists pumped with rage and once again. "_Everything_ was going as we had planned! We were going to destroy the Emperor and restore the Republic. But Kenobi was too petty to simply accept the defeat of his Jedi Order and wilt away in the night. He struck a deathblow from the gutter. Without your father, I was exposed and vulnerable."

"What happened?"

"I was not always confined to this suit, young Skywalker," Vader said heavily.

Luke nodded, understanding at once.

"Palpatine broke me down and bound me to his will." Vader's voice was, for once, genuinely wistful. "I have been his slave for nearly twenty years. I never thought I would escape, until he decided to discard me and his lieutenants aboard the Death Star botched their attempt to assassinate me."

The last failsafe Luke had against Vader's influence-the shaak-headed stubbornness he'd no doubt inherited from his father-was waning. Under the black mask, Vader smiled, knowing that now was the time to strike and speak the advantage that the Force had given him.

"Now," Vader said, "You are all that remains of your father's legacy. In your blood, you contain all of the strength and power that was once his. You only have to learn to use it-"

Luke blinked. "You want to teach me?"

"Why else would the the Force have drawn us together?" Vader asked. "You can destroy the Emperor and restore justice and freedom to the galaxy. That was your father's destiny, before his life was viciously cut short by a man he had once called _master_. Now, it is yours to fulfill."

"I feel the Force," Luke said. "I want to learn how to control it."

The Force crystallized around Lord Vader and the whispers of the Dark Side revealed secrets through a thousand reflected facets. It became clearer now than it had ever been before that he had the power to take Anakin's son and transform him into something more. Just as Palpatine transformed Anakin all those years, so too would Vader transform Luke.

"Then you would learn the ways of the Force and become a Sith like your father?" Vader asked.

Luke looked down, as the moment stretched on, filling with his hopes and doubts and fears...then was hollowed of all that when he looked up at the Sith Lord. "Yes. That is my pledge."

Vader felt the darkness fluctuate as he studied the Luke's implacable expression. The first hints of his son were already emerging from the shell of this backwater farm boy. For that, he was grateful. Of that, he was proud. He patted the son of Skywalker on the shoulder and smiled behind his mask. He was pleased.


	10. Chapter 8

Veers closed his eyes as he washed his hands with warm water, then stooped down to splash his face with it. He'd heard that the original Veers spelled their names Vyrz and had Mandalorian blood in their veins. Maybe that was true, or maybe it was something that his father-an emasculated flimsy-pushing accountant from Axxila-had made up to give his son courage when he came home from school and complained of bullies.

Either way, it was the Mandalorians, and their worship of war, that Veers had spent much of his life admiring. That was why he performed the same hand-and-face washing ritual before every battle and maintained a solemn expression and mindset when armoring himself.

The General secured his utility belt and slipped on the silver pauldron that identified his rank to the other men fit snuggly over his left shoulder. He completed his pre-battle ritual by looking at the picture of his wife he kept in his locker. There was a sentimental part of him that still existed, buried beneath all that armor. He could only tune it in just before taking another dance with death on the battlefield.

A buzz over the comm of the landing craft alerted him. Their Y-85 Titan Dropship would be landing in sixty seconds. His walker would be disembarking in seventy-five.

A week had passed since he stormed the bridge of _Devastator_ with a company of his loyal troops and shot Captain Wermis in the face. Wermis' officers stood aside as he did it and all but cheered when he named Lila Bendix, a brilliant and popular Commander, the new captain of _Devastator_ and announced to the whole ship their new course: defection.

They rendezvoused with _Tyrant_, _Avenger_ and _Countryside_ out in uncharted wild space to regroup and organize a new hierarchy. The defectors called a council aboard _Tyrant_, the group's unofficial flagship, consisting of the captains of the four star destroyers, their flag officers, the two generals and their colonels. Veers was selected as their provisional leader, over Madine and Lennox, by a vote of eleven against six and three.

After deciding leadership roles and taking an exhaustive tally of their men, equipment and provisions, the council voted to extend an offer of alliance to the Rebel high council through General Madine's contacts. The tail end of their meeting was interrupted by a communique from the bridge-they'd just heard of Tarrth's destruction by Death Star superlaser. The men from Needa's camp were distraught. Their captain took the opportunity to request an adjournment, which the rest of the council granted, then they retreated to _Avenger_ so they might mourn the loss of their homeworld.

When three days passed and they still hadn't received any word from the Rebels, Veers called another meeting and put forward the idea of proceeding with raids and attacks on imperial holdings on their own. Needa and Lennox's camps were taken aback at first by the suggestion, but listened when Veers started showing them intel dossiers on nearby vulnerable imperial holdings.

And that was what led to the staging of this attack on Isond, a merchant hub on the extreme fringe of some regional importance, was going as planned. The single Victory-class Star Destroyer the defense fleet kept in orbit was no match against the combined might of _Devastator_, _Avenger_ and _Countryside_. The small orbital defense station (poorly designed and placed station that it was) was dismantled by Xamuel Lennox's focused bombardment. The only unforeseen development was the deployment of a powerful energy shield that prevented the direct bombardment of the government sector of Kikulith City, Isond's capital.

To declare victory and seize this world in its entirety, they would have to sack that government center, loot its banks and treasuries and kill the Moff in charge-a man by the name of Reethus. To fulfill that requirement, Veers activated his contingency plan, an invasion strategy he'd devised utilizing information passed to him by intel assets within the city.

Now, his elite walkers-known by the moniker "Thundering Herd"-was landing in clusters of eight in the financial and commercial districts that surrounded the government sector. Kikulith City was set upon a flat yellow plain. The city itself was a couple dozen square kilometers of three to four story durasteel tenements and concrete, astroturf-paved parks. In short, it was the perfect playground for his All Terrain Armored Transports.

As usual, his team of walkers would be the first on the field. This was why so many of his fellow officers and peers feared him, why Vader respected him and why the rank and file loved him: he led his troops in strategy and in person. He piloted the lead Nexu droid in all boarding attacks and despite his forty-eight years, he still liked to lead his men into a melee on foot.

His peers had long ago stopped questioning his sanity but they still didn't understand. Combat was about so much more than the intellectual stimulation of forming stratagems and mastering tactics. War was not meant to be waged in a war room. It was meant to be executed in the killing fields of the front. The ritual of battle was about the primal joy of squeezing the trigger yourself, of personally inflicting damage and annihilating the enemy. Your armor, your troops-your entire command-was just an extension of that trigger finger.

The General slipped on his helmet and marched onto the bridge of his walker.

"General on deck!" Lieutenant Athzaria said as he straightened his posture and gave a customary salute. The two pilots, the comm officer and the two gunners swiveled about in their chairs and gave their salutes as well.

Veers nodded. "Continue with the landing."

Moments later, a sudden thud and the hum of the engine gears turning indicated that they had landed. The General flipped one of the switches above his station, causing the long periscope to descend and release. Through this lens, he was given a unmitigated, three hundred sixty degree panoramic of the battlefield. He saw everything-the smoke rising from shelled-out buildings, the sweeping movements of TIE bombers delivering payloads in their low-altitude precision bombings, the pillboxes of defending troops that were uselessly trying to damage the walker with their small arms fire and most notably, that ominous red globe of energy that they were steadily marching towards.

They eventually passed through the energy shield and heavy artillery cannons situated on the regional palace walls started firing upon their walker. The entire cockpit shook as the heavy armor screamed while absorbing the punishment.

Veers grabbed the microphone that linked to the entire herd's comm channel. "This is your General. All artillery squads prepare to deploy. I want you to rain as much fire on those palace turrets as you can."

He closed the comm and looked to one of his gunners. "What's our distance to the shield generator?"

One of the gunners swiveled around. "Two point seven kilometers, sir."

His eyes narrowed. Two point seven? That was beyond the computer targeting system's effective range, beyond, even, the manual targeting abilities of his staff. But it wasn't beyond his range. He turned back to his scope and started tapping through the various barometer readings. That was a shot he could make, depending on atmospheric conditions, wind speed, humidity...

Veers stopped mid-thought as he suddenly remembered that they were under an umbrella deflector shield, which served to mitigate all external atmospheric pressures. They were, for his intents and purposes, within a calm. He grinned as he leaned away from his scope and looked to his gunners.

"Fire link all weapons to my scope," he ordered.

Then he peered through again, carefully aligning his sights, compensating for the tiny defects in the AT-AT's targeter that he had learned of from experience. He adjusted for the natural rate of decay and energy dissipation then gave the order to fire. He pulled away from his scope as the AT-AT brought all of its guns to bear. Scopes were good for aligning shots, but he always preferred to witness the carnage with his own eyes. Through the transparisteel of the cockpit, he saw the thick, crimson energy bolts of the walker streak off into the distance, eventually striking the small box-like grey structure behind the palace that was funneling power into the red deflector shield.

Veers frowned when it didn't explode. "Prep another volley," he said. "Maximum firepower."

The entire walker shook as it adjusted its stance, shifting its balance towards its rear in order to stabilize itself for the power it was routing to its weapons systems. The General watched as several more energy bolts lanced off into the distance, once again striking (and this time completely leveling) the enemy shield generator.

All six of his men in the cockpit cheered and Veers allowed himself to grin. That was all too easy. He turned to his comm panel and pressed down on a button to hail his colleague that was still aboard _Devastator_. A miniature hologram of Crix Madine appeared before him moments later.

"General," Veers began, "the shield is down. You may begin your landing."

Madine acknowledged with a nod and closed comm. Thousands of 501st Stormtroopers would be swarming the Palace in minutes. This little melee would be over in less than an hour.

"Increase our speed and continue our march on the palace," Veers said to his two pilots.

.

The Thundering Herd reached the palace fifteen minutes later, a mass of razed garrisons and armored pillboxes in their wake. Enemy casualties numbered in hundreds, if not thousands. Civilians had taken to the streets, cheering on their liberators in droves and tossing incendiary cocktails at the Imperial troops making their retreat. TIE bombers still swept over the avenues, though now their payloads consisted of recruitment leaflets and small aid packages, rather than thermal detonators and ion charges. So great was the triumph that Veers even authorized one of his Lieutenants to stand outside the top hatch and wave the Thundering Herd banner.

Veers rappelled down from his AT-AT upon reaching the palace steps. Several buildings of the compound had been reduced to smoldering ruin. The walls were still intact though and it was surrounded by thousands of civilians, all clamoring to get a hint of what the new conquerors would do. Upon reaching the top of the steps and main entrance to the palace, Veers turned around and observed the frenzy just beyond the gates.

"Where is General Madine?" Veers asked one of the stormtroopers that was standing guard at the massive entrance to the palace. Once the shield generator was down, Madine had landed a couple hundred of his troops on the palace roof and led the assault against Reethus himself.

"He's in the lower levels, sir, releasing the prisoners."

"Prisoners?'

"Local leaders and politicians."

Good. At least they had someone they could hand this planet off to when they left. "Do we have Reethus in custody?"

"Yes, sir."

"Bring him out."

The trooper nodded affirmative then turned to enter the palace. Veers turned again to observe the mania just beyond the palace gates. The city had become a madhouse. Restoring order would be the paramount task, and the first step in that direction would be to sate the blood lust of the people. Moments later, Reethus was dragged out from the palace, practically kicking and screaming.

"Who is in charge here?" He bellowed before meeting Veers' cold gaze. "Are you the fool that dare attack this Imperial city-"

"No, Moff Reethus, _you_ are the fool," Veers said coldly.

"What are you talking..." He suddenly stopped as he caught sight of the 501st flag that Madine's troops had raised on the banneret. He gave a shallow laugh. "Is this some kind of joke? You barge in here with Imperial craft, under the flag of a dead man-"

"If it is, then the joke is on you. Even if the flesh rots, the spirit lives on." Veers stepped forward and the rotund Moff shrank and shriveled under his harrowing glare.

General Madine walked out of the castle with a phalanx of stormtroopers, his plastoid armor plates shining in the twilight sun. "General Veers!" he called, mirthful smile on his face.

Veers turned then smiled before raising a hand to salute his colleague. "You performed admirably today, sir."

"As did you." They shook hands before Madine turned to the Moff. "Have any plans for our prisoner?"

He looked to the gates and the mob beyond. "An indulgence, for the fine people of this world."

Madine frowned, then leaned closer to Veers, voice just over a whisper. "Don't you think a trial first would be more appropriate?"

Veers shook his head. "Why? We already know what the people want. Besides, there's no sense in trying to put on another show when we already have this fine stage set for us. Come on. Lieutenant Lokar!"

Lokar, a man in his mid-twenties with a soothing bass voice and a handsome, chiseled face, served as the public face for the legion. He paced over and saluted the two Generals.

"Be ready to address the crowd," Veers said, pushing Reethus toward the gate.

"You're not going to get away with this," the Moff said as stormtroopers grabbed him and dragged him towards the stairwell that led to the top of the palace walls.

"We will," Veers said. "With so many other worlds ripe for the picking in this region, you'll soon be forgotten along with the rest."

As soon as they stood atop those walls, directly adjacent to the palace gates, the crowds below erupted in cheers. Lokar raised his voice projector to his lips as a couple of stormtroopers motioned for the crowd to calm down.

"Ladies and gentlemen of Isond, we are the warriors of the 501st and we have come here to liberate you from imperial tyranny!"

Massive cheers. Jubilant elation.

"As we speak, the elect of your former government are being released. The leaders and thinkers that once defined your society are being returned to you, after years of unjust imperial detention." Lokar paused, allowing the crowd to get more cheers out of their system. "However, there is the matter of your former governor. I present to you Moff Reethus."

The crowd screamed with disdain as Reethus was dragged to the front.

"What shall we do with him?"

"The crowd clamored, with dozens of people yelling their suggestions all at once. The situation degenerated into a sort of verbal anarchy before one man stood above the rest by climbing atop an overturned speeder. "Pitch and yaw!" he yelled. Soon everyone else was yelling along with him.

Veers smiled. The pitch and yaw was a particularly nasty form of punishment that these rim-worlders were fond of. He would gladly indulge them.

"Get some engine fluid and rope," Veers whispered to Lieutenant Athzaria. "Make it quick."

Several minutes later, Athzaria returned with several crew members of Veers' AT-AT. They had several buckets of steaming hot engine fluid and a durasteel tow cable. The stormtroopers looped the tow cable around Reethus's ankles and tied the other end to an outcropping on the wall. Afterwards, they pulled out vibroblades and proceeded to strip him of his uniform, cutting him several times in the process.

Veers then nodded to Lokar, giving the final authorization.

"So much for imperial tyranny!" Lokar shouted as they Reethus off the ledge.

Reethus flew off, swinging out and slamming back into the wall hard as he reached the end of his cable. Once there, the technicians from Veers' AT-AT poured the smoldering engine fluid all over him. He screamed and flailed uselessly as the oil boiled his skin. The crowd cheered viciously then surged forward with clubs in hand once the technicians had emptied their buckets.

Veers turned to Madine as the Isondians started taking their own vengeance upon Reethus. "Do you disapprove, general?"

Madine's heavy frown slowly let up. "At first, yes. But I can see why doing things this way has its perks."

Veers nodded, then turned back to the crowd. He could get used to being showered with this sort of affection.

.

The next day, Veers was holding court in the palace yard. He sat with Aigel Thazj and several aides, reviewing combat reports and dispatches from the three-pronged battle that had occurred the day before.

The Thundering Herd was reporting eight casualties: four men were killed while dismounting from their AT-AT's, two were injured when their AT-ST was hit by an RPG, one soldier was shot in the flank in a friendly fire incident and another burned his hand while trying to repair an overheating engine piston.

The 501st lost sixty-five toopers in their landing.

In space, _Tyrant_ had taken several hard hits while destroying that fixed orbital platform. Lennox's command was reporting six crewmen killed when a bulkhead next to them took a direct proton torpedo hit and shredded open. They had twenty-two other casualties, all caused by similar incidents.

_Devastator_ and _Countryside_ were reporting no casualties. _Avenger_ had taken the brunt of the punishment when they engaged the VSD _Osprey_ in orbit. _Osprey_ was severely damaged in the fight but was eventually boarded and subdued by the marines from all three Star Destroyers. Vital systems, among them propulsion and sensors, were heavily damaged on the _Osprey_, though much of it was reparable. A preliminary engineering report said that it would take a week of repairs to make _Osprey_ hyper-space worthy again, another six after that to restore it to top combat capability.

Twenty-seven marines from their boarding party were killed, another thirty-five were wounded. Aboard _Avenger_, seventeen gunners were killed by TIE bombers and a bridge officer, Lieutenant Nash Vassic, was killed by a console overload. Needa wanted to give him a large military funeral, with full honors. For his part, Lennox agreed-then recommended the ceremony be held down in the city and be made public. Any chance to further lionise themselves before the people of Isond should be taken and exploited for the recruitment opportunity it was.

Not that they _needed_ some elaborate, heroes' funeral to increase their recruitment of the public here. The leaflets they'd dropped around the city had done much of that work for them. Five meters away from where Veers was having his council, Lieutenant Lokar and seven aides were tending to a line of potential recruits that extended out of the palace, down the block and around the corner. It would seem as though every young man with poor prospects of getting married and starting a family was willing to sign away his life and join their crusade.

Isond, like so many other planets transitioning from an isolated, pastoral economy to a free-trading, galatically-integrated one, had a key demographic feature: a population bulge in the sixteen to twenty-seven year-old bracket. As such, so many families had too many sons, and most of those sons would have given _anything_ for the chance to see a corner of the galaxy _other_ than the one they were born in.

Veers was going through a very lengthy ledger of credits, precious metals and other valuables looted from the palace when his attention was called to the approach of General Madine. Veers looked up from his report then stood up, knowing that something important must have happened for Madine to come down here personally.

"Looks like a lot of good folks are hungry to put a hurtin' on the Empire," Madine said as he surveyed the line of recruits.

Colonel Thazj shrugged. "Sir, we're also offering three hots, a cot and more adventure than you could find in a lifetime of this backwater."

"True," Madine said as he took a seat. "What are we going to do with all these recruits?"

"I suppose that depends on our needs..." Veers stroked his chin. "What do you think, General? Does the 501st need fresh men?"

Madine considered it for a moment then shook his head. "I think that for now, the 501st would better serve us if we kept it as an elite division of shock troops. What about forming a new division?"

"Could be done," Thazj said, setting down the file in his hand to flip through another. "A lot of capable soldiers and marines aboard _Osprey_ bent the knee when we boarded them yesterday. Maybe we can lump them with some of this rabble into a new legion."

"...and reward one of our best with a new command?" Madine asked.

"I like it." Veers nodded to his colleague, then turned to Thazj. "What do you think, _General_ Thazj?"

Thazj's lips crowned slowly, into the faintest, humblest smile Veers had ever seen. "I think I would like that, sir."

"Well then, pending full council approval, appropriate paper work and all, it's yours, Thazj." Veers matched his respectful nod, then turned to Madine. "What's going on, Crix? Something you wanted to discuss specifically or were you just checking in?"

"Max, the rebels have made contact," Madine said. "They want us to send our leader to meet with them aboard their command ship and discuss terms."

Veers leaned back in his chair and shuffled his fingers together, thinking hard about the offer.

"Well," Madine began, "which of us do you think should go?"

Veers zoned out for a moment, looking over Madine's shoulder to the huge line of young men waiting their turn to pledge fealty to their mission. Lieutenant Lokar was running out of oath flimsies to give the new recruits.

After a beat, he shook his head. "I don't think any of us should go."

"No?" Madine scratched his stubbly beard. "An alliance, with terms for supplies and reinforcements is what we want from them...right?"

"Yes. But I think they should be given an appropriate perspective."

"What do you mean?"

"Think about where the Rebels are now and where we are. What we have to offer them. After all they've been through recently, they want _us_ to come to them?" Veers shook his head slowly.

Madine appeared baffled by Veers' words. "I guess...but an agreement is an agreement, right? Does it really matter who grasps the olive branch first? Don't you think so, Thazj?"

"I don't know, sirs," Thazj said. "This is all a bit too political for my head."

Veers swallowed then leaned forward, setting his elbows on the table as he folded his hands together. "It's simple, we have something to offer the Rebels that they don't have-that they've never had. Even before they had their backs broken by Tarkin at Yavin, they were a rag-tag band of amateurs in high-end snub fighters with some Old Republic relics for commanders. How strong do you think they are militarily now?"

Madine frowned. "But they still have funding-"

"Have you seen this seizure report?" Veers asked, pointing at the file he was just reading. "We will be good on that end for a while."

Madine picked up the file and his eyes practically bulged out of their sockets when he finished skimming over it. "Kriffin' hell, was this a banking planet?"

"Possibly," Veers said with a nonchalant shrug. "Maybe a lot of wealthy people from the Inner-Rim hid their wealth out here so it would be harder for the tax collectors to get a cut of it."

"With this much money, will we even need High Command anymore?" Madine asked.

Thazj shook his head sadly. "Money does get spent, General, that's its nature."

"After the upkeep of our forces," Veers began, "the payout to these new recruits, a cut of the plunder that our men are probably expecting, a payout to the people of this planet, and repairs to the _Osprey_, we'll be lucky if we have fifteen to twenty percent of that left over."

"Still pretty sizable."

"It gives us some time to operate," Veers said, "move on and raid another planet. We should be getting out of here as soon as we can, moving on to the next skirmish."

"I agree," Madine said, "it minimizes our exposure to a counterattack."

"It's a warrior's way. But we can only keep going on like that for so long-and that's why we need the Rebel High Command. We are warriors. The Rebel High Command doesn't have a lot of that right now, since their military got crushed on Yavin, so they need us. And we need them, too. They're politicians. They have legitimacy. But for now...the sword is mightier than the pen. If we wait a while, and keep burning through the rest of this sector, accumulating victories and treasure and recruits-and most importantly, reputation, then High Command is going to have no choice but bend and ask if they can join us. Because if they don't find a way to put their names at the head of our military uprising...they'll cease to be relevant. Trust me, Crix, if we get a few more wins like this, they'll be courting us. Not the other way around."

Madine thought on it for a moment before nodding in agreement and flashed a wide, ear-to-ear grin. "You sure we even need them? Seems like you might be all the politician we need, Max."

Veers smiled, then looked again to the line of recruits streaming through the palace yard doors. Maybe, indeed.


	11. Chapter 9

Ahsoka had done all she could to keep herself from going crazy inside this coffin of a cargo container. Zev and Leia were lucky to have left the city when they did several days ago. Since then, Ahsoka has had more than a couple run-ins with Imperial troops. She bloodied and escaped them each time, but each run-in had her being forced deeper and deeper underground, to the point where she could not even show her face outside.

Whoever was in charge of this imperial operation was determined to throw everything and the refresher wash bowl at her. Thousands of new imperial troops were being landed on Ansion daily. These troops had no respect for the local government and had nothing holding them back from overturning every rock in the city.

Whoever was directing this manhunt knew who they were after, so _Twilight_ was probably impounded already, on some Star Destroyer in orbit where search teams were ripping it apart, piece by piece and scrutinizing every file on the computers. And if _Twilight_ wasn't being subjected to that kind of deconstructive horror in orbit, then it was still inside a space port that was positively swarming with stormtroopers. Obi-Wan and Siri probably would have made a run at it, pull some real space-ranger type poodoo like that, but Ahsoka knew there had to be another way.

Besides, Obi-Wan and Siri would have had a big advantage over her: they were human. In a galaxy primarily populated by humans, twi'leks and rodians, togrutas tend to stand out like sore thumbs. Orange skin can be dyed over; togruta leks can be disguised to look twi'lek, but montrals... Any headdress she used to hide them now, when the city was on such high alert, would still stand out just as badly.

She spent several days looking for another way out. Every gate house was guarded by a battalion of stormtroopers. The storm drains that emptied below the city walls were similarly guarded. Homes and businesses were being searched daily, often at random times and alternating intervals. Even the sewers were starting to be patrolled intermittently. In a city as small and flat as Cuipernam, it was only a matter of time before the sheer numbers of troops flushed her out.

Smuggling herself out as a piece of cargo seemed to be the last remaining option. After getting into several scrapes around town, trying to find a secure terminal to transmit a signal, she finally got word out to her good friends and arranged for her extraction. Given the extreme security measures in force at the space port, Ahsoka had to resort to a cockamamie plan that only a _Corellian_ could come up with.

Ahsoka squirmed, trying to satisfy an itch on her lower back that was just outside her reach. She struggled against the cargo container before giving up and just trying to will away the discomfort. Oh, she would be getting back at Han for this little caper. Just as soon as she was on the Falcon again.

Ahsoka drifted off for several hours, alternating between meditating and sleeping. The signs of movement up the line came with a sudden jerk and a shift in overall balance. The hum of loading droids told her that she was on the right path-until she heard some voices through the wood that told the droids to stop. Ahsoka pressed a montral to the box and started making out the individual voices.

"I don't care what the foreman said."

The loading droids beeped and hummed in protest.

"Listen, you hunk of scrap metal, there's no such thing as expedited packaging when security has been set this tight. Commander Jade wants every parcel travelling through this spaceport searched."

"Yeah," another voice came in, "pop the cans so we can get a look."

Ahsoka closed her eyes. If they opened her crate, she was done for. She reached out with the Force. A little Jedi mind trickery was easy, but when done like this-blind, with no frame of reference for her target-that was a much taller order. She pressed her montrals a bit closer to the crate, if she could use her hearing properly, she might be able to get a better fix on her targets.

She focused the Force through her montrals, then got a burst of information when a metal pipe fell, sending echoes through the chamber...a cargo chamber that had to be about fifteen to sixteen cubic meters, with several cargo stacks diving it up. She could make out the tracked wheels and the repulsorlifts of the loading droids making their own movements, getting out of the way of three sets of armored footsteps.

That's it. That's them, the stormtroopers. Ahsoka closed her eyes and focused as they came closer to her stack of cargo.

"We've been working pretty hard," one of the stormtroopers said. "We've been sweeping these things all day and we have yet to find a single piece of contraband. Maybe we should let the rest of this batch go. Move on to the next."

"Yeah, I suppose, if you say so, sir."

Ahsoka grinned to herself as she heard their footsteps clatter out of her cargo bay. The rest of the ride through the bowels of the space port's cargo lanes was filled with the innocuous sounds of loading droids and conveyor ramps. When the cargo box finally stopped moving, she heard the growl of a a familiar wookie through the wooden boxes. A hand patted the box.

Ahsoka reached out with the Force and popped the top off the wooden crate. She pumped her elbows out, breaking the sides of the box open in one swift motion. She sat up, cracked her back in several places, then her neck, then started stretching her arms and rolling her shoulders. When she was done, she looked up and flared her brow at Chewbacca.

"So good to see you, my old friend," She said with a smile.

And I'm glad to see you, Ahsoka. He grabbed her and hoisted her up in a hug that only a Wookiee could give.

Ahsoka laughed as he set her down. "C'mon. Let's get out of here, Chewie."

She looked forward to not returning to Ansion for a long, long time.

* * *

><p>Han Solo was sitting at that black-and-white checkered dejarik table in the main hold of the <em>Millennium Falcon<em> when he heard footsteps echo up the main corridor. They were too light and graceful to be Chewie's, so he knew that his passenger, the Rebel Togruta General, had arrived.

He turned to look over his shoulder and saw her standing at the mouth of that circular main corridor, arms folded over her chest. She was wearing a shockingly tight green dress, whose bright hue contrasted sharply with her deep orange skin. It was a major departure from the drab robes and military jackets she always wore.

Han couldn't help but look her up and down once or twice. As his gaze drifted up from her bosom, the white markings on her face that approximated eyebrows knitted into a frown.

"Since when do you dress like that?" Han asked with an empty grin.

"You didn't know me when I was a fourteen." She took a seat in the chair at the engineering station across from him.

The grin didn't dissipate. "It would have been awkward. I was seven."

A grin formed on her face, wide enough to match his. "Hello, Solo."

Oh, the usual treatment. He leaned back and scowled as the ship shook and tilted slightly.

"I told Chewbacca to get us out of here," Ahsoka said.

Han's gaze narrowed. Blast her. She was already starting to take over his ship. "So," he began, "where do you need to go?"

"_Home One_, it's stationed out beyond the galactic rim," she said, swiveling in the chair. "It would probably be best to shuffle around the transit lanes for a while, lose anyone that might follow us. After all, the Empire's after me."

"The Empire's after you? You don't say." Han scoffed. "Since we're complaining about our troubles, the Empire's after _me_ right now. Imps stopped me at three different Mid-Rim stations. If it wasn't for all the fake IDs and my charming demeanor, we would have been toast."

"So the Empire's taking in female officers now?"

He shrugged. "What, you thought Juno would be the last?"

Ahsoka shook her head. "You know Han, one day you are going to face judgment and I won't be there to protect you."

"You're here now, so that day is not _to_day. I'm fine with it."

"Anyway, we both need places to hide." Ahsoka shrugged. "Aren't you glad I came along when I did? When it comes to hiding from the Empire, there aren't much better places than _Home One_."

"Hmph. You think I don't know a million different rocks I can hide under?"

"Oh..." Ahsoka tilted her head to a side. "I almost forgot you were smuggler scum. Hiding's one of your specialties."

"Hey," he said, poking his finger forward, "I don't appreciate being called scum on my own ship."

"Alright, you're a scoundrel. _Big_ difference." Ahsoka's brows lifted in a mocking expression. Her eyes narrowed. "Does that make you feel any better, Han?"

"A little," he said, nodding sarcastically. He added with a tease, "But the thought of hiding under a rock with you makes me feel a lot better."

"Oh Han," she gushed. "What did I tell you when we first met? I'm way too old for you."

"That was five years ago!"

Ahsoka shook her head. "And you still aren't grown up enough."

"Hey!" He protested sharply. "I've changed lots since we first met and you know it. And some respect would go a long way, you know. I thought you Jedi were trained around the principle."

She chuckled lithely. "You didn't know my master. But I think he would have liked you."

"Well, I know you and like you, but apparently that's just not enough, is it?" Han asked with a resigned sigh.

Ahsoka smiled tellingly. "So," she began, "are you gonna stay with me on retainer after _Home One_, Captain? I'll be needing a fast ship and I seem to have lost mine."

"Depends," Han said. "whats the going rate?"

"Same as usual, no changes since our last arrangement."

"I don't know..." Han shuffled his fingers together pensively. "I get the feeling that this is going to be very dangerous."

"You like the danger, don't lie."

"I take it you'll need my fast draw, then?" Han winked whilst making a blaster motion with his right hand. "In case you forgot, I do require hazard pay."

She shrugged. "Just put it on the Alliance's tab."

Han leaned back with a wide grin, knowing that meant the pay was going to be big. He didn't work for her as much as he used to, but when he did, the payout was always worthwhile. Saving that Princess from the Death Star netted enough credits to pay off his entire debt to Jabba the Hutt_ and_ left enough behind for an epic gambling binge on Cloud City-the date for which had yet to be determined.

"I already know you don't feel the same," Han said, "but I love you, Ahsoka."

"I don't sign your checks, Mon Mothma does," Ahsoka said flatly. "Maybe you should love her."

"Hmph." He grunted. "Remind me to give her a big wet kiss the next time I see her then."

Ahsoka snickered a couple of times, then her nose crinkled as she seemed to truly process what he said and she started laughing vigorously. There was a break, then she started laughing again and he let himself laugh with her. They just looked at each other and kept chuckling, until the humor of the situation seemed to transcend some off-hand joke about Mon Mothma.

It was moments like this, and the thousand others that proceeded it-specific ones he'd already forgotten with his mind, but always remembered in his heart-that allowed him to be at such ease around her. Her expression started to change and told him enough to pull him from his reverie.

"There's something else, Han," she said.

"What is it?" He asked, brows flaring up at her sudden change of mood.

"It's Bria."

Then his brows condensed back down, into a frown that was decidedly angry. "First Rendar, now you? What, did you agree to become her messenger droid too?"

His dealings with this other rebel woman in his life was remarkably less stellar. Bria had conned him twice in the past two years, each time making a bigger ass of him before important underground contacts. She was the reason he would _never_ take a permanent commission from the Rebels, not matter what terms Ahsoka could negotiate.

It had to be one of life's great ironies that he ended up having a serious, committed relationship with her before he met Ahsoka.

"Tell her that I don't want to hear it," Han said, bristling. "I took a big hit on Ylesia-or did you forget? Some people are still holding it against me-Lando, for example. It's not alright."

"She's dead, Han."

That shut him up. Han leaned back in his seat, mouth hanging open slightly as all those taut muscles in his jaw relaxed; so thoroughly had the anger been crushed out of him by those simple three words. All of his resentment seemed to hollow out.

"When the mission on Toprawa started to turn south," Ahsoka said, "I went out there on Twilight to provide some evac. There were only commandos still alive when I got there. She wasn't one of them."

And just like that, Bria Tharen was gone. Bria, whose love had once set his soul on fire. Whose betrayal had turned him inside out and never want to fall in love again. Bria, who captivated him from first glance a little more than ten years ago. _Ten years_? Had it truly been that long, since Ylesia, the exultations and their insane escape? What did it even _mean_ to know someone for that long? He didn't know. There was no one he'd known for as long-or nearly as long, for that matter-as Bria.

"Han?"

He closed his eyes. "So she's gone. What now, then?"

"You're the only person that knew how to contact her family," Ahsoka said. "Even the Alliance didn't have a line to her people."

Bria came from a good family of wealthy means. That made her death so much more tragic: at any point, she could have gone back home, married into an even richer family, have a couple kids and lived the good life. Instead, she got mixed up in drugs, then after kicking that habit, she got into this little crusade.

Han nodded. Bria's father was a good man. He deserved to know what happened to his daughter.

"I'll send a message," he said, rising to his feet. The numbness he felt in his face spread to the rest of his body.

"Hey," Ahsoka said, placing a hand on his arm to stop him before he left. "Are you okay?"

Her blue eyes, so large and so beautiful, were fixed on him and wide with concern. When she smiled at him he pursed his lips and looked away. He was close to Ahsoka, but not so close that he couldn't lie to her. There were some things that hurt so much that you just couldn't share them with anyone.

"I'm fine," he said, removing her hand from his arm.

He left her in the main hold and walked down the corridor to his cabin, where he promptly shut the door and locked it. He collapsed in his bed and started recording a message to Renn Tharen. He didn't finish until his third attempt.

* * *

><p>Twenty years later, the whispering woods were still scarred. From the boulder at the summit of the Weeping Bluff, Zev could see gashes in the earth, huge swaths of forest that were completely torn out and had yet to regrow. Large chunks of siege machinery and broken battle droids shone, their rusted metals glinting under the light of three moons. T'ra Saa and her former Padawan Mace Windu had made their stand here against General Grievous and a droid army five times the size of their GAR Deployment. Only one of them left.<p>

Unusual Imperial Activity in the Mid-Rim near the Chommel Sector had pushed Zev to take a detour here and wait until things calmed down before resuming the journey to Naboo. Tashyma was a small, anonymous world with very little going for it, other than its being the site of a major Clone Wars battle. The Jedi had been using this as a hiding place for years.

The Weeping Bluff had a special significance to Zev, though. This was the place that Ahsoka had brought him to begin his training. She made him climb the two hundred meter tall cliff face, swim across both legs of the forked river, wade through the bogs and swamp and run through the woods. Now that he was a teacher, he made his student do the same.

This was the third night of their stay here. Leia was asleep, thoroughly exhausted from a day's worth of rough physical training. Zev couldn't sleep.

Something about his new charge had kept him up these past few nights. When he first met her, he didn't detect her sensitivity to the Force, but now that she was training, she practically glowed in it. It was that, the fact that she seemed to be growing more and more powerful everyday, and her uncanny resemblance to Pooja Naberrie that unnerved him.

How could two people, from two different worlds look so alike?

Zev stood and turned to face the Neti tree. She had grown since he had last visited about six months ago. Now her canopy was truly magnificent, spreading out to a diameter of about seven meters, casting a nebulous shadow over much of the summit and the forked river below. He walked to her and placed a hand on the dark brown bark. He could feel her presence in the Force.

"I'm afraid," he confessed. He'd spoken to Master Saa many times over the years. She had never spoken back, but he knew that she was listening. "I'm always afraid now."

There was a curious swirl in the Force, a query from the master. Zev frowned, unsure of where to begin. He found himself wondering what Master Saa's voice must've sounded like, and at what point she would be recuperated enough to actually speak with it, rather than communicate with slight hints and nudges in the Force.

"It's Pooja," he said. "I miss her. Well, I always used to miss her but now I think about her all the time. She's always on my mind, the first thing when I wake, the last before I fall asleep. And when I saw all that activity in Chommel, I thought that maybe the Imperials finally caught up with us. What if they...what if they got to her and the younglings?"

His heart was completely open. He never felt the need to hide anything from Master Saa. He'd always felt secure around her, ever since he'd met her eight years ago. Ahsoka said that she had been in this hibernation form since she was wounded in the battle of the Weeping Bluff all those years ago. General Grievous had cut her in half with a diagonal blow that caught her from rib to shoulder. It's good that the Neti are so difficult to kill.

"I'm not sure if this is good for me." He bit his lip. "I'm a Jedi. Duty is supposed to come first, but how can it when I'm so preoccupied thinking of her? I love her so much that sometimes I'm...terrified of my own feelings. How did I even let an emotion this strong develop? It's more than I can control at times."

Her question made him balk.

"Am I supposed to control it?" Zev echoed. That was antithetical to everything he was taught, everything he was meant to believe. The Jedi Philosophy was decidedly against attachment and possession. It stressed the need to be in control of emotion at all times. But what was this emotion, what was this love if not that: a passion that could only spiral from his control?

Her next question made his heart flutter.

"I don't know." He sat down in front of her and closed his eyes. "I don't know what I'd do if she was killed. I..."

He felt her push him through the Force with a scenario that made his blood curdle.

"I wouldn't." Zev swallowed hard. "I wouldn't let it affect me like that. I would _never_ give in to the Dark Side, no matter how much I hurt. Pooja would never want that from me and I wouldn't disappoint her like that."

Her approval filled him with warmth, though he couldn't quite smile because he still ached-longed-for Pooja.

"I know," he said to the Neti tree. He couldn't always control how he felt. He could only control how he behaved. "I _am_ a Jedi."

He frowned and turned from Master Saa as a high-pitched scream filled the night. Zev stood, sensing a disturbance in the Force, a roil tide of panic and rage and anguish that even made Master Saa react with worry. Leia was still in her sleeping bag, though she was tossing and mumbling things under her breath.

"No...peaceful...no weapons..."

Zev sat at her side and wondered what sort of nightmare she was having. It must have had something to do with Alderaan. The poor girl had seen her own homeworld destroyed before her eyes. Her parents were murdered. It wasn't too much of a stretch to say that the experience scarred her. He placed a hand gently on Leia's forehead and looked back at the Neti tree for help. Together, they eased Leia's pain.

When she woke in the morning, Leia denied ever screaming, or even having a nightmare. She started running through the gauntlet before he got the opportunity to follow up with another question.


	12. Chapter 10

After departing Yavin 5, Luke, Shira and Vader traveled halfway across the galaxy, to a remote space freighter rest stop along the Yunis route to ditch their blatantly conspicuous Imperial shuttle for a more ordinary freighter of Kuati design. Now, they were at last approaching their true destination.

An extremely fertile world, blessed with flowing rivers and an abundance of natural resources, Baraxis Prime was hardly the sort of place one would expect a Sith Lord to use as a hideout. Luke contemplated this as he gazed out through the viewport on his side of the ship's cockpit. The fields of endless green below got bigger, to the point where he could discern the shapes of the individual crops and fields.

Luke looked over his shoulder to Shira, who was completely absorbed with piloting the ship. He turned back to his window. She had said little to nothing to him since they left Yavin 5, and that bothered him. She made no attempt to address what had happened on the planet, or explain why she'd lied to him and told him she was a Jedi. His attempts to start conversations with her were frequently shot down with untelling shrugs and dismissive one-word answers. When she wasn't piloting the ship or locking in a course, she was reading through reports in her datapad. She almost treated him as though he didn't exist.

He frowned as he once again considered the lightsaber that dangled from her belt, and the way she'd threatened him with it. She was Vader's student, as he was now. Exactly why he felt threatened by this, he couldn't say.

His mind fell silent as a massive flat-topped mountain came into view and grew in width and stature as the freighter came closer. Paved roads and concrete structures built on the mountain's slope and surrounding foothills. Numerous tunnels were dug into the mountain's side. The ship veered over the mountain's flat top and the true epicenter of the city they were approaching came into view.

"What is this place?" Luke asked.

"This is Baraxis Prime's tallest mountain, Mount Zendera," Shira said, not bothering to turn from her viewport. "It used to be a volcano, but the magma chamber collapsed on itself thousands of years ago. Settlers moved into the huge caldera and made a city. Zendera-Ashla."

Luke nodded. It was a pretty big city. If he had to guess, the caldera was at least a couple of dozen kilometers wide and it was entirely covered with skyscrapers, some of which were even taller than the caldera rim.

Shira banked the ship about thirty degrees north west and they approached the caldera's rim. Multi-tiered stone structures were hewn out of the massive cliffs. They featured extended balconies, open-air stairs running down the length of the caldera rim's face and landing pads that corresponded to each penthouse.

Brie piloted the ship to a soft landing upon the pad that corresponded to his penthouse. The sound of Vader's respirator filled the cockpit as the landing gear engaged. Luke turned to his master, who was standing in the doorway, arms crossed over the control panel on his chest. Vader nodded to him then turned and disembarked from the ship, followed closely by R2.

Luke disembarked after him. The landing pad was suspended about five meters away from the cliff face, over the sheer drop that was easily six kilometers deep. He couldn't help but feel a moment of nausea as he looked up and paced up the walkway to the expansive balcony of Vader's penthouse. The balcony itself was rather plain. There was no fancy flooring or tile work, no etchings in the stone walls, no stylized handrails, just the simple, brown rock of the cliff face and a few pieces of furniture. Vader was standing before the double doors-which were really nothing more than two huge slabs of rock-that led to what Luke presumed was the rest of the apartment.

Vader lifted his hand, stopping Luke as the stone slabs began to slide apart. "Shira will show you to your room," he said. "Leave me to my meditation. I will contact you when I am ready to continue your instruction."

Luke nodded and stood in his place on the balcony and sighed as Vader vanished into the stone hall. That creeping uncertainty took hold of him again and he once again started disassembling his situation and circumstances with doubt and fear. The shuddering panic of those three questions-_Who am I? What am I? Who am I becoming?_-rapidly rose in his mind. Would Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen approve of him become an apprentice to the most infamous and feared man in the galaxy? Of course not. Darth Vader was a murderer, that's what Uncle Owen had said the few times he had ever bothered to discuss the empire.

But...but...Uncle Owen didn't _know_ Vader. Not like he did, at least. He didn't know that Vader had once been his father's student. He didn't know that Vader was just a slave to the Emperor, executing orders against his own free will. He didn't know that Vader was the galaxy's best shot at ridding itself of the Emperor.

Besides, Uncle Owen had never taken a stand for anything in his life. He was a little person, content to lead his little life in his little corner of the galaxy, until his ignoble at the hand of Tarkin's troops. So, Uncle Owen's judgment was entirely invalid. At least in this situation.

Yet, as much as Luke told himself that, the doubts wouldn't settle. He couldn't just knuckle them down.

He straightened his posture and turned as Shira Brie exited the ship. The confident thwap of leather against the stone signaled her approach. She stared directly at him, deep into his eyes, as if intent on making up for all the time she'd spent ignoring him during the flight. It was impossible to gauge her intent, to classify her as friend or foe. She was a pretty face and a blank void in the Force.

"Follow me, I'll show you to your room," she said.

He did as commanded, following her through those stone slab doors, down a narrow hallway and into a large, cavernous room. Though wide enough to facilitate a game of quarterball, the room was still not large enough to quash the feeling of claustrophobia Luke felt when he looked up at the steeply vaulted ceilings. Like the balcony outside, all of the surfaces were hewn from the stone and smoothly sanded down. It was furnished with the same basic greel wood chairs that littered the balcony.

The chamber was set up to be a sparring area. Circles painted on the ground denoted dueling rings. A dozens of combat training droids-all of different shapes and sizes-were deactivated and neatly stowed in alcoves on the sides of the room. A pair of lamps that hung from the ceiling some seven meters overhead provided lighting in the form of a faint, yellow tint that made the brown stone walls somehow appear white.

"This is the training room," Shira said. "Expect to spend a lot of time here."

She led him across the huge room to another pair of stone slab doors that slowly slid open. As they walked, he noticed another pair of stone slab doors to his right. He could only speculate that those led to Vader's quarters. She continued on, leading him through another narrow corridor that eventually terminated in simple rectangular room.

Unlike the training room, this room had a fairly low ceiling and not much space to maneuver. It was a rather claustrophobic condition. A full size bed was set against the wall to his right, opposite a long couch and an alcove for storing clothes. There was one other greel wood chair and a greel wood bookcase filled with old, dusty volumes and nothing else.

"This is your room," Shira said. "You should settle in. Do you have any other questions?"

"Yeah." Luke scratched his brow. "Something that's been bothering me, for a while now, and I feel I have to know-why did you lie to me on Yavin 5?"

Her features softened and for the first time, she didn't sound as though she was performing a chore. "I didn't lie to you."

"You told me you were a Jedi-"

"No." She seemed amused. "No, Luke, I never said that, you just chose to believe that, just as you chose to believe that I was looking for my 'Jedi' master."

Luke rubbed his forehead, confused feelings streaking through his mind.

"What, you're not mad at me, are you?" She asked incredulously. "Seems a bit silly to be, seeing as how everything turned out well anyways. My master has taken you in and you're going to be taught the ways of the Force. You should be pleased."

He scowled at her. "Are we going anywhere else, or can I expect to be here for a while?"

"Master maintains strongholds on many worlds, though I don't see why he would make us relocate from here." Shira paused. "I spent most of my time learning here."

"Really?" He flashed a sardonic smile. "Is that the truth or just another thing I 'want to believe?'"

She pretended not to hear his tone. "I grew up here. Where are you from?"

He slipped his pack off and set it at the foot of the bed. "Tatooine."

"I'm sorry," she said, shaking her head as she looked at the floor.

The laugh that escaped him was short but genuine. "It really wasn't that bad."

"You say that 'cause you don't know what you've been missing out on."

"Fortunately I have you to help show me the ropes...right?"

Her grey-green eyes fell upon him. "Maybe. That'll depend."

"...on?"

She shrugged. "My mood. The time of day. The day of the month. Prevailing weather conditions. Up and down trends in the galactic economy..."

He laughed. "I'll take that as a yes, then?"

She shook her head. "You'll take that as a maybe. I don't know you-"

"Yet," Luke said pointedly. "But you'll find I'm a nice enough guy."

She tilted her head to a side. "Then why did Vader choose to train you?"

He considered her for a moment then said, "Vader knew my father."

Shira's green eyes sharpened before she looked away and Luke knew that something about his admission had pierced her armor. Her gaze gave off a moment of panic that lasted just long enough to see beyond her stony exterior.

"Why?" Luke asked. "Are you not nice?"

Another shrug. "I can be."

"Let me guess," Luke began, "...the ups and downs of the galactic economy, right?"

She chuckled. "Anyone who said material things didn't make them happy was a liar."

"That doesn't seem very consistent with our master," Luke said. "After all, for one of the most powerful men in the galaxy, he doesn't seem to have a lot of things..."

She frowned. "He's fighting to replace the most powerful man in the galaxy. What do you think?"

He conceded the point with a nod before briefly considering their respective roles as Vader's apprentices.

"Where's the refresher?" He asked after a silence.

"Do you have to use it?"

"Not right now, no."

"Tell me when you do," Shira said as she released the shoulder straps on her pack. "I'll show it to you then."

"But..." Luke was confused as he went over the layout of the apartment again in his head. He didn't remember seeing another room or passing a hall that could lead to one. "Where's your room? Where would I find you?"

"This is the only bedroom in the apartment," she said flatly. "I stay here."

"Oh." Luke frowned.

It would seem that Vader had never planned on having more than one student, either. They stared at each other for another long moment before Luke blinked and grabbed his pack.

"I'll, uh, take the couch, then," he said.

"You don't have to," Shira protested. "You can sleep on the bed."

He smiled, all too eager to play the rural gentleman. "Thanks, but I don't want to take it away from you. I mean, you were here before me."

"Take the bed from me?" She tilted her head slightly, playfully confused by his offer. "You know we can share it, right?"

He raised his brows and felt his cheeks darken at her suitably flirtatious response. "You tease, don't you?"

"I? Tease?" She stepped closer to him, until to her warm, shallow breaths fell lightly against his collar bone, which was exposed by his athletic v-neck shirt. "You're cute," she said with a smile. Then she tapped his temple with her index and middle finger. "I really like your imagination."

She captured him with a lascivious gaze that made his blood smolder. The instincts in his head and the hormones in his blood were telling him to grab her, take her in his arms, throw her on the bed-or at least lean forward and kiss her! He couldn't think of any other way to interpret the things she'd said. She was practically asking for him.

But he was too shy. The moment passed before he made any attempt to act. And she backed away, the look in her eyes more curious than disappointed. She turned without a word, casually shattering the moment as a shard of glass against the stone floor.

"You should relax, Luke," She said. "I don't bite, _really_."

He forced a chuckle as she started to rummage through her pack, once again looking for that book. When she bent, his gaze fell upon her rear and lingered there, before slowly shifting to the lightsaber that hung from her belt.

He suddenly remembered how she'd almost decapitated him with it twice.

* * *

><p>Ahsoka had missed her old crew mates.<p>

She'd been extremely attached to them in the past, something she had almost forgotten after three years of being on her own. Their journey from Ansion towards the galactic rim would only take four days (once all the short stops for fuel were factored in) but she was already beginning to seamlessly integrate with her old crew mates.

Dejarik games with Chewie had once again become a part of her daily ritual. Han spent a day in isolation. News of Bria's death affected him more than he would admit. Yet once he emerged, they got back into a rhythm, arguing over how best to tinker with the Falcon's secondary systems whenever a glitch came up. The three-way competition they had for best score on the quad-laser cannon's target practice simulator resumed. It had all become part of her daily ritual again, and she found herself living a life that hadn't been hers in a long time.

What life was that? Well, it predated these two, and the misadventures they had while running guns for Garm Bel Iblis with _Twilight_ several years ago. She could trace this nostalgia back to the Clone Wars, back to when she was a Commander in the Grand Army of the Republic. That was the last time she was as completely surrounded by friends as she was here.

She remembered all of them, the Jango Fett clones that had been her subordinates and companions. Their individual names and personalities, the little things they did to style their hair or tattoo their skin so they could stand out from the next otherwise identical soldier. She remembered her friends. The band of brothers that accompanied her on every battle, that supported her on every skirmish. Most of all, she remembered Rex, and the soul-crushing day the Emperor handed out Order 66.

This had been her life since: running from one hiding place to the next. Accepting the tutelage of her adopted master while keeping to the shadows. Making only surface-deep connections with the rebels she had to work with and keeping at arms length the handful of recurring contacts she did maintain.

She thought of Han and Chewie, the two mercenaries she had known and employed the longest. She used her allocated funds to pay them a handsome retainer fee. Was there a reason she did that, rather than hire them job-to-job, as she did Rendar and Merkaru? And was this it? Had she subconsciously singled them out as people she could invest both trust and affection into? "Friends," like the Jango Fett clones? Like Rex? Before the kill switch in his blood had been toggled by the Palpatine, and she had no choice but to cut him down?

Ahsoka sighed. She was a Jedi. Possessions were not supposed to be a part of her life. What about friendships, then? Was there room for that? After all, what was a friendship if not a binding attachment? Sure, not as binding as a marriage or even a romance...but an attachment nonetheless.

Could she allow herself to get used to being with Han and Chewie again? Roaming the stars in a freighter, the same way they had aboard _Twilight_? This was not home. As much as she wanted to take a place as warm and secure as this and claim it as a home, she could not. She would not have a home, so long as the temple lay in a shattered ruin on Coruscant.

The _Millenium Falcon_ had been in a state of constant transit ever since picking her up on Ansion. Her crew never made port for more than an hour or two for refueling or delivery of whatever package of spice or arms it was smuggling. Ahsoka appreciated Han and Chewbacca's solid routine. They knew exactly how to get lost in the Corporate Sector and the Outer-Rim. The two scoundrels had become real professionals since she first introduced them to the smuggling game years ago.

The time she had alone she spent looking after Luke, though the trail had gone cold long ago. Han had already swept the Yavin system in a search for any transponders or beacons he might have left up after a crash landing and found nothing. Her sources in Alliance and Bothan Intel had failed to dig up any information on him passing through any of the major Imperial jails. So it was impossible to know where he was, just that he was alive.

And knowing that in itself was disturbing enough. Ahsoka had watched Luke for many, many years. She knew his Force Signature about as well as she knew Leia's. If he had died, she would have sensed it. If he was alive and imprisoned somewhere, then she would have been able to sense that, too. But the muffled answer she got from the Force when she queried after him meant that he was hiding-or actively being hidden.

There were other disturbances in the Force that she could feel making waves across the entire galaxy. People, goods and arms were being shuffled around the galaxy. Every port they made-from Taris to Socorro-was swimming with gossip and rumors of Imperial troop movements and fleets being redeployed. Something major was happening, but the Force still refused to settle and give a clear portent.

Finally, word from her apprentice compelled her to act. She was leaning back in the cushy, Rancor-leather seat that surrounded the dejarik table in the main hold, a cup of Corellian tea in hand when he contacted her.

"Master?" He'd said, voice dutiful as ever.

Ahsoka smiled at the miniature hologram of him. "Where are you, Zev?"

"I'm on Tashyma."

She blinked and tried to remember the last time she was on Tashyma. It had been so long. "And how are things there? Has Master Saa awoken yet?"

"She's no more conscious than she has been." Zev shook his head. "However, her branches have begun to leaf and I that that she's reached another phase of her recovery."

"That's...that's good." Ahsoka didn't know what else to say.

Master Saa had been asleep, in some sort of healing trance since the battle of Tashyma twenty-one years ago. Given the severity of the injuries she sustained, it was difficult to determine exactly when she would wake-much less, when she would be able to assume a mobile form.

"Leia asked me to teach her again," Zev said.

Ahsoka smiled, remembering that forecast she'd given him during their last correspondence. "Is that why you're on Tashyma?"

Zev nodded. The forests around T'ra Saa's sanctuary was known for its rough, varying terrain. It made an excellent training ground, for anyone inclined to such challenges. "She's learning Teräs Käsi at a very, very quick pace and her...small body has been remarkably resilient to my intense physical training routines. She's having more trouble with the meditation techniques, but she's starting to learn patience."

Ahsoka was unsurprised. She had known Leia's father, after all. "Why are you surprised? I told you she had the potential."

"I know, it's just...daunting to see someone zip through all this lightyears faster than I ever could."

Ahsoka took another sip of her tea. Zev wasn't gifted with a particularly powerful connection to the Force. In the days of the old order, he never would have been selected as a Padawan learner. He would have been sent to AgriCorps.

"Don't let her talent daunt you, Zev," Ahsoka said. "She owes it to her heritage."

His brows furrowed quizzically. "Her heritage?"

Ahsoka's thoughts drifted from Leia to Leia's father. Anakin. After all these years, the name still sent shivers up her spine. Ahsoka's thoughts retreated back to the day she first met him at the Battle of Christophsis. The years of the Clone Wars raced through her mind and she recalled the battles she'd fought with Anakin and Obi-Wan at her side. They'd been heroes, all of them.

And it was still impossible to reconcile that with the fiery confrontation on Mustafar. Despite everything that had happened there, the horror of it all, the heat, the flame. She couldn't turn away, not even when his skin seared and his face started to turn to slag...

"Master?" Zev's brows shot up, confused at her silence.

She looked up at him, barely cognizant of the silence that had passed.

"Are you alright?" He leaned forward. Even with the distortion of his miniature figure, it was easy to see the concern on his face. "What's wrong?"

She started losing herself to her own thoughts again. All that Zev knew about her previous master was what the old Republic's media machine had made him out to be. Anakin Skywalker, action hero, whose grizzled visage was plastered all over the Clone Wars news updates that Zev had watched as a toddler. Could she burden him with the truth now, after the myth had done so much to drive him into the arms of the Jedi Order? Could she dispel one of the pillars of his belief and rob him of his childhood hero?

She could not. She would not. It was terrible enough that she had been there that day on Mustafar, that she had seen it for herself. After all, Anakin was more than her teacher. He was her hero and idol. The entire galaxy had trumpeted and exalted him as a savior, and she had always beamed with pride at being his student, even after the Council re-assigned her to Siri.

Accepting it was so difficult that...that she hadn't fully accepted it yet. She wasn't like Obi-Wan or Siri. She would never give up. She would never consider Anakin beyond redemption.

"It's nothing," Ahsoka finally said, shaking her head.

He scratched his cheek. "Why didn't you tell me about Leia's gift?"

She frowned indignantly. "I told you she had potential."

"Yes, but you didn't mention that she could be one of the most powerful Force-users of all time...When I did a blood scan to check for any infections, a midi-chlorian test came back positive for a count of twenty-six thousand five hundred and twelve."

Ahsoka gaped for a moment. She hadn't known the exact count...

Zev sighed. "And I'm pretty sure that you knew that _before_ you assigned me to train her. So...why didn't you tell me?"

"_Zev_-" She stopped herself, trying to temper the annoyance that rang out so clearly in her tone. "We had to protect her and her secret for a very long time."

"But why...why would you give me this responsibility?" He crossed his arms over his chest.

"You really think you can't handle it?"

He gawked at her. "With her latent potential, Her Majesty could learn to toss star destroyers and crush asteroids. I can't even move a stylus off a table. How am _I_ even remotely qualified to instruct her?"

"You know the basics, Zev. No one knows them as well and as thoroughly as you. It's all you know-and because it's all you know, you can't push her beyond what she's ready to learn. That's how her father failed-"

"Her father?" He looked confused and bewildered as he frowned deeply. "Was Sky-"

"Her ancestry doesn't matter, Zev."

"It does to me. I think I _deserve_ to know."

Ahsoka shook her head, eyes wide and indignant as she glared at her apprentice. "It's not important, alright?"

The contrite look on his face said that he already got it: she wanted to move on to the next point of discussion. But that expression, and all the regret inherent in it, didn't stop him from muttering, "why are you always holding things back from me...?"

Whenever she closed her eyes, she could still picture him the way he was when she first met him. Sixteen years old. Angry, alone and without a credit to his name. Chewed up and spit out by the Imperial Youth. Bereaved of one parent and abandoned by the other. Wide-eyed and amazed at the thought that he could one day become a Jedi and truly emulate his childhood hero.

He'd come a long way since, but she still saw so much of that angry vulnerable child in him that she knew that she had to protect him. This was just one of the last ways she could.

"Anymore news on Madine or your father?" she asked.

His jaw locked for a moment, the way it always did whenever his father came up in discussion, then he shook his head. "I just forwarded Madine's request to the Chief."

"And how did Mon Mothma react?"

"She's...she's actually considering it," Zev said. Ahsoka buried her face in her palm. "She said that if Madine is his number two and Madine has been selling us info for eighteen months now and if Madine trusts him then..." Zev leaned back on the rock he was sitting on and sighed. "Maybe he could be trusted, too."

Ahsoka snorted. She couldn't help but feel suspicious at this turn of events. After all, Maximilian Veers' defection came hand-in-hand with news of Vader's "demise," and with echoes of Vader's movements appearing across the board, even that piece of news didn't seem to add up.

"What do you think, Zev?" Ahsoka asked. "Can he be trusted?"

"I told her that I would never trust my father or advise anyone else to." He sighed. "But you know me. I'm biased. I hate him. And I hate the thought that he might actually find me-"

"That will _never_ happen, Zev," she said steadfastly. "I'll make sure to it."

"Thank you, Master." He smiled, then his gaze shifted to something in the distance for a moment before coming back to Ahsoka. "Leia's almost finished the gauntlet I put her through. I have to go."

"May the Force be with you, Zev."

"And with you, Master."

About a minute after Zev ended the transmission, her comm vibrated with another message-though this one was just a short text.

_General Tano,_

_The Chief of Staff would like to personally debrief you and your mercenary retainers._

_Aileen Tahn_

"Oh, what the kriff," Ahsoka groaned as she slapped her forehead with her palm again.


	13. Chapter 11

Leia sat in the _Durasteel Gull'_s co-pilot seat, mind adrift and body asleep as it streaked through hyperspace. They'd left Tashyma a day ago but her muscles still ached from all the running and jumping and climbing he had put her through in in that god forsaken forest. Her mind was equally sore. All that time spent thinking, contemplating, meditating, "clearing her mind" (whatever that was supposed to mean)... it drove her crazy. She knew, while she was doing this, in the middle of the forest on some far-flung planet, the Alliance was moving along, making decisions and determining the future of the rebellion _without her_.

She was also struggling with something Zev had told her earlier, about the nature of the Force and Jedi philosophy. The Jedi moral absolutism made the Alliance's high-handedness pale in comparison, and it left lingering questions in the back of her head, questions that the Death Star and the obliteration of her homeworld had placed there. She was beginning to recognize, in her own way, that such absolute commitments to...morality were crippling and impractical. After all, every rule had its exceptions, every situation it's counter-point, correct?

But Zev had denied that, in the sharpest, most explicit way. _The Force is for knowledge or defense-_never _attack._ Even now, she disagreed. There _had_ to be situations when it was appropriate for a Jedi to ignore that rule, to unleash the full spectrum of their Force abilities and attack.

Even though she was thinking that now, she couldn't reconcile it with all the ideals she had been taught growing up. The Alderaani were dedicated peace and reconciliation. But how can you reconcile when all you have left are asteroids and space dust? How can you make peace with people that murdered your entire homeworld?

No, no. That thinking was for before, before the Empire had the Death Star, before someone like Tarkin could unleash such destruction with the push of a button. The stakes were much, much higher now and no measure could be taken as too extreme to consider

She was dizzy with her thoughts and lost in all the implications they created. If...if she were given the opportunity to confront Tarkin, would she stop and arrest him? Would she give him his day in court? Perhaps, before. Yes. But she had the Force now, and she could use it to stop him-in the crudest, most absolute and permanent way. And she would, if she ever got the chance.

Did that make her bad? Or vulnerable to that Dark Side that Zev had spoken of? Leia couldn't reconcile that sort of absolutism with her new, emerging notions of right and wrong. How could punishing the wicked make one dark?

Zev walked in from the back and took his seat before pulling back on the drive lever. The _Gull_ made a smooth transition from hyperspace back to real space, pulling into the gravity well of a beautiful blue-green planet that raced into view.

"This is Naboo," Zev said, gesturing to the planet.

Leia found herself glued to her starboard-side window as they made their descent to the planet. She caught glimpses of lush, forested land, of expansive plains bisected by rivers, of large seas and majestic mountains. This was a beautiful world, not unlike hers.

"Where are we going?" Leia asked.

"The Lake Country, a very remote area in the south," Zev said.

Leia nodded and looked out her window again as the _Gull_ began to slow its descent and its airspeed. They were close enough to see, in far greater detail, the beauty of the planet. There were many valleys, peppered by pristine lakes, tied together by slow-moving rivers that featured an occasional waterfall. The entire region was circumscribed by snow-capped mountains.

A few minutes passed before the _Gull_ made its final descent, towards one of the larger lakes in the region, which had at its center a wooded island.

"That's Varykino," Zev said, "it's a retreat, the closest thing to a temple our order has had since the Emperor razed the temple on Coruscant."

Leia nodded as the _Gull_ circled around to the far side of the island. A structure was built onto hill mountain that sloped down into the lake. Terraced atop its small docks was a large balcony that framed the other cylindrical structures, whose teal domed tops glistened in the waning sun.

"Doesn't look like there's much in the way of landing pads," Leia said.

"No, not for our ship, anyways," Zev answered, toggling several switches on the circuit board over his head. "But no worries, the _Gull'_s waterproof. And submersible. We'll be fine."

The sound of water sloshed over the hull as the _Gull_ lowered into the lake. The whole craft shook for a second, gently rolling with the minute currents of the lake before stabilizing against the bottom. Leia looked out her window then turned up to see the distant sun shining through the water. She frowned then turned to Zev.

"Exactly how are we going to get to the temple from here?" She asked.

He shrugged. "I usually just swim."

Her eyes narrowed.

"What?" He threw his arms out as though he'd been accused of murder. "It's only three meters or so to the surface. And the water's refreshing. Trust me."

.

Zev meant freezing, didn't he? Because the water was freezing. It was so cold that Leia felt her teeth chattering before she had even reached the surface. She shook violently, chilled to the core. It turned out that the mountains in the distance were snow-capped for a reason: it was winter here, or at least close to it!

Thankfully, they were only a couple meters away from the dock after reaching the surface. That Zev was so calm and unaffected by the freezing temperature only annoyed Leia more. He swam briskly to the stone steps that led up to the balcony and hopped out without missing a step. He took a moment to shake the water out of his hair then hoisted Leia out of the water.

"Y-y-you said _refreshing_!" Leia said furiously.

Zev pursed his lips, then looked up to the top of the stairs, where a twi'lek teenager stood with two towels.

"Master Zevulon!" He said, pacing down the steps. "Who is that with you?"

"Yes, Arlan," Zev said, walking up to meet him halfway. Leia was too busy shivering to follow him up the steps. "This is my friend, Leia Organa."

The twi'lek gave a smart bow as he presented the towel. "Good to meet you, Miss Organa. You've got the shakes really bad. Here, this ought to help."

Leia smiled gratefully and took the towel, which was made of a lavishly plush sort of cotton that seemed to absorb the water off her skin almost magnetically. Still, she rubbed the towel against her body furiously, trying to create any kind of friction heat. She managed to keep pace with Zev and Arlan, despite the fact that her muscles were still locking up from the cold.

A woman in a regal white dress awaited them at the top of the balcony. She turned to face them and Leia stopped abruptly. This woman was about half a head taller than her, with deep blue eyes and a scar that ran diagonally from the right side of her jaw to her chin. Otherwise, she had no distinguishing features. She could have been Leia's sister. Or even an identical twin.

"Understand why I had to do a double take when I first met you?" Zev asked in a whispered tone as Arlan dismissed himself.

The woman paced over, followed by a red-paneled protocol droid. "I am so happy to see you again, Zevulon," she said, bowing her head.

Zev bowed in return. "A pleasure, as always."

"Welcome home, warrior." She turned to Zev's guest. "You must be Leia?"

Leia nodded slowly, still in awe of Pooja's uncanny resemblance. They gazed at each other for a while. Pooja's face was smiling. Her eyes were sad, carrying with them nostalgia for a time that Leia could not have possibly known. Then she stepped closer, and that sadness dissipated, replaced by exultant joy.

"I am so happy to finally meet you," Pooja said. There was a warmth to her words and expression that comforted Leia immensely. It had the effect of silencing all of her rogue thoughts and bringing her back to the present. "I have heard so much about you, from Master Olin, from Master Tano, from Zev..."

"So, are you as amazed by the resemblance as I was?" Zev asked.

Pooja glanced at him momentarily before turning back to Leia. "Either of you want anything to drink? Caf or tea perhaps?"

Zev laughed and she smiled back at him mirthfully. "Tea, please."

"I'll...have a tea, too," Leia said. "As long as its hot."

Pooja turned to her droid. "And a tea for me as well. Thank you, GC-50." She looked back to Zev as the red protocol droid walked away. "Zev, I'm supposed to be teaching the younglings right now. Advanced astrology. Do you think you could step in for me?"

"Of course! I...love astrology." There was the slightest hint of sarcasm in his voice as he flashed a smile. "I'll talk to both of your later."

Leia barely noticed his departure. Her eyes were still fixed on Pooja, as she turned from him to look out to the lake. Leia saw it again. That sadness, steeped in nostalgia...

"It's almost winter," Pooja said. "Zev should have known better than to make you swim the lake."

Leia smirked as she got the last of the shivers out. That short little swim must have been a test of some kind. Swimming, after all, was one of the few exercises he had not forced her to do on the ship. The red protocol droid returned, bearing a tray with two cups of piping hot fluid. Leia wordlessly thanked the droid and immediately started drinking the tea.

"Your planet is beautiful," Leia said between sips.

Pooja turned to face her. "It is, like yours. I always longed to see the snow blossoms on Aldera again..." 

"You've been to Alderaan?"

Pooja nodded. "I went with my family. We were honored guests of Viceroy Organa-"

"Wait, you knew my father?"

Pooja smiled. "I think that 'knew' would be too strong a word. I met him a couple of times when I was six. He was a very kind, very noble man. He gave me several pieces of Anderoisian saltwater taffy."

Leia's lips crowned, almost forming a smile as she remembered the candy that was her father's favorite. He had consumed so much of the foodstuff that the excess glucose had started to be a detriment to his health. Mom always used to give him earfuls when the tests showed spikes in his blood sugar.

Of course, those concerns were all irrelevant now.

"You're not alone here, Leia," Pooja said, her solemn tone carrying the weight of spires on its back. "This place is a home for orphans like us. The victims of the Empire's most insidious genocide."

Again, she felt comforted by Pooja's magnanimity. "You've lost family?"

She nodded. "You and I have a higher concentration of midi-chlorians in our blood than the galactic average. Long ago, the Jedi started using technology to track people like us and recruit them. The Empire used the same technology to hunt the Force-Sensitive. You and I and the dozen children here represent the tiny minority that Ahsoka and Siri and Zev had managed to save from the slaughter."

Leia nodded, looking down to water's edge, just a meter or so below the edge of the balcony.

"Walk with me, Leia."

Pooja paced away from the balcony's edge, past two narrow alleys that cut between the two main spires and towards a bridge that connected to a rock spire that jutted out of the lake, about ten meters away from the main island. Narrow walkways, hewn from the rock, spiraled around the spire before feeding into a central chamber, naturally lit by large solar lights cut from the ceiling.

Leia looked around, intrigued by regal silk bannerets displaying what she believed was the Naberrie family seal. Formal portraits, of dignified ladies and gentlemen from ages ago, were mounted on the walls, their acrylic paint preserved by the glass that sealed them to their frames. The north side of the room had dozens of pedestals, each one emitting a holo-portrait over its apex when approached. Each pedestal had under its holo-projector, display and control panel a small alcove bearing a decorated clay jar. And each jar had upon it a gold plaque, bearing a name, date and epitaph.

Leia looked to Pooja, confused as to why she would have brought a stranger into a place as intensely personal as this family mausoleum. A creeping suspicion began to manifest, one of the possible explanations for their uncanny resemblance...and Leia's conscious mind eagerly batted away, too fearful of the repercussions of accepting that reality.

"When I returned to Varykino, about ten years ago," Pooja began, "I decided to renovate everything and dedicate the complex to the Jedi Order that had saved my life. Everything...except this. My family has owned this island for a dozen generations. So many of my ancestors have been laid to rest here. I could not help but respect my parent's wishes and bring them here as well..."

_My _family_. My _ancestors_. My_ parents. There was no attempt to project, no effort to push her through implication. Leia was not lost on that tiny detail. After all, there was a possibility...and Leia looked at Pooja's face and felt that the truth was as undeniable as their resemblance.

"What happened to your family?" Leia asked, as fearful of the question as she was of the answer.

"I lived in Theed when I was a child, just around the corner from my grandparents and several blocks away from the palace where my aunt had reigned as queen for eight years," Pooja said. "That was before Palpatine declared himself Emperor, before my grandfather, an intellectual and university professor, wrote an article condemning his usurpation of the senate's powers and tyrannical behavior. That article became a thesis for counterrevolutionaries. They nailed copies of it to palace doors during the riots after Queen Apailana's assassination by Darth Vader's 501st Legion.

Pooja's expression changed considerably as she continued. She spoke on gingerly as though the next words could do physical damage if said incorrectly. "That got him on the list of the Emperor's enemies. After they came and re-asserted control, he was arrested and murdered. My grandmother drank herself to death months later, unable to cope. By that time, Stormtroopers were patrolling the city regularly. That's when Master Obi-Wan and Master Siri came here, looking for me and my sister.

"The Force manifests itself erratically in my family, always skipping three or four generations and only gifting females with enough sensitivity to use it. Sanaa, my great, great aunt," Pooja paused to gesture to one of the pedestals, "was a Jedi. My older sister and I were the first since her to carry the gift."

_Older_ sister? Leia's interest piqued at the revelation.

"Obi-Wan and Siri were interested in training us. My father wouldn't allow it. He thought that getting involved would only get us killed as it had my grandfather. He wanted the safety of neutrality. It wasn't until Stormtroopers, with their midi-chlorian scanners, showed up at our door that he realized he had no choice."

Leia squeezed her eyes shut, feeling Pooja's pain through the Force.

"He fought them, so they dragged him out into the alley and shot him. Then they shot my sister-that had been their mission: to exterminate the Force-Sensitives. I don't know why their scanners couldn't detect my gift, or why they chose to not to kill me and my mother anyways."

One man's resistance was enough to get the death penalty for him and his whole family. That had always been standard Imperial logic.

"My mother was never the same. She was twisted by hatred and anger. Driven mad by that moment of helplessness when they killed her husband and firstborn. That loss tapped into something. She wasn't a fighter. She wasn't tough. Her younger sister-my aunt-was. When the Trade Federation invaded Naboo thirty years ago, my aunt shot her way through a battalion of droids with nothing but her clique of body guards. I think...I think she was always insecure about her relative weakness and her younger sister's strength. That's why she sent me to the Jedi and left to become a revolutionary. I never saw her or spoke to her again. She was killed in a riot about a year after Obi-Wan started teaching me."

"I am so sorry," Leia whispered.

She managed a smile. "These are old wounds. They heal, but scars always form."

Leia's focus shifted to her jaw. "Is that-"

Pooja touched the scar that traced up her jaw. "This was from the man who shot my father. I was eight when it happened."

Leia wanted to reach out and hold her hand, to embrace her. There was a kinship she felt with her that cut deeper than any reason or emotion could explain. Seeing her whole planet with her father and family on it incinerated from cold depths of space was horrific enough. She could not imagine the trauma of seeing them shot in person, as Pooja had.

"All the adults in my family died traitors, so the Empire saw fit to confiscate all our possessions. Our accounts on several worlds were seized. Our properties were foreclosed, our ships, our speeders...everything, except Varykino. Because it was still in in my aunt's name."

"What happened to your aunt?" Leia asked.

Pooja's eyes glinted with a sharpened acuity as she looked up at her. "I'll be direct. You know what is going on here. What this place is. You've known since you swam out of the lake and saw my face. You are just too afraid to say it-and I don't blame you. This is not something you could have prepared for, or something you could have even imagined."

"Everyone I've ever known and loved was incinerated before my eyes..."

"I know and I'm sorry. But I'm not asking you to let go-I would never. You are as much Bail and Breha's daughter as I am Obi-Wan and Siri's. And no matter how strong your misgivings about these people," Pooja gestured to all the pedestals in the room, "understand that mine are stronger. My mother abandoned me. My father lacked the courage and resolve to do the right thing and he got himself and my sister killed because of it. Coming back here...accepting my place here...was harder than you could imagine.

"But if you can accept this, for all its flaws and imperfections," Pooja paused, "then we are the last of the Naberrie clan. And we are family."

Leia closed her eyes and tried to mute the thoughts, feelings and fears the way Zev had taught her. _You feel the Force when you're calm and at peace_, he had said. And that was true, because as Pooja waited forlornly, just an arm's length away, Leia started to feel the reassurance she needed to open her heart to this. She opened her eyes and nodded, in tune with the warmth in her heart that confirmed this to be right.

"We're cousins, then?" Pooja asked.

Leia nodded again. She asked, "What was my mother's name?"

Pooja brought her to the pedestal dedicated to Padmé Naberrie Amidala and told her everything she knew.


	14. Chapter 12

Luke's arms strained under the weight of his own body as he tried to pull himself into a handstand on the pull-up bar.

"Focus," Lord Vader said. "Use the Force."

He finally lifted himself over the bar and strained for several seconds while trying to find a sustainable balance. When he did, he looked over to the pile of stones about fifteen meters away, then closed his eyes, trying to picture the pyramid Vader had built with the stones during the demonstration. He felt the first stone through the Force and started maneuvering it.

Then his grip started to slip. His eyes shot open as the burn in his arms told him that he couldn't maintain this for much longer. He looked down at his master and saw that Shira had just joined them in the training room.

He dropped and the stones dropped with him. He looked up at Vader, then to Shira, who was covering her mouth to stifle a laugh. Luke sighed.

A week had passed since their arrival here and Shira hadn't so much as given him the time of day. While he spent most of the time with Vader in the training room, she was always either coming back from or leaving for some mission, the details of which she would never reveal. Twice he came into the room, exhausted after a hard day and find her at the desk in their dorm, writing letters and dispatches-to whom, he could only speculate. When he asked, she would look up at him with a bored expression and say that she was doing work for their master, a claim he only half-believed.

Occasionally, he'd catch a furtive glance from her, an echo of the..._interest_ she'd shown in him the first day that they arrived. But he still couldn't read her in the Force, or coax anything from those looks to make something meaningful happen. And now that she thought he was a joke...what chance could he have?

"Care to demonstrate?" Vader asked Shira.

She nodded to Vader then smiled capriciously at Luke. "With pleasure."

Luke walked away from the pull-up bar as Shira stretched her arms and rotated her shoulders. Then she jumped up and grasped the bar, pulling herself into a one-handed handstand with a fluid motion. Once stable, she closed her eyes to gather the energy of the Force.

And Luke's scowl deepened as the stones started to quiver and move. She aligned the nine red stones to form the base of the pyramid, then layered the four green stones above and placed the single black stone at the top. An exact replica of the pyramid Vader had made as an example.

She released the bar and landed gracefully. "Simple enough?" She asked Luke as she brushed back her dark red hair, not a single bead of sweat on her forehead.

That was it. That was the look, the sparkle in her eye that excited him, that, for better or worse, made his blood and his thoughts race. He didn't know anything in that moment except that he wanted her so badly that nothing else made sense. In fact, his desire for her itself made no sense. Somewhere in his mind he knew that this woman was dangerous-not just dangerous, but possibly unstable as her brief meltdown on Yavin V had shown.

But that didn't matter, because she was the most beautiful he'd ever met...even more beautiful than the Alderaani princess he'd rescued on the Death Star. As intimidating as it should have been, the power she had just demonstrated only made her more seem more attractive. It opened the door to more questions and thickened the veil of her mystery.

Who were her parents? If Luke's attunement to the Force could be traced to his bloodline, then surely her parents must have been powerful Jedi as well. How had she come to be in Vader's employ? How long has he kept her as an apprentice?

That look had only lasted a second, but it kept his eyes glued on her even as she turned and bowed to their master and excused herself to return to her mission. Even as she walked out, not sparing him a second glance, he followed her with her eyes, until the stone slab doors creaked shut behind her.

"You must be mindful," Vader said.

Luke blinked, then shook his head, so lost in his own thoughts that the swift return to reality was discombobulating. "What?"

Vader's head tilted to a side. "Perhaps you don't believe me when I say this, but I _am_ human. There was a time when I thought as you do now."

He frowned. "About...her?"

"No." Vader said, "but specifics are immaterial. We are equal parts thought and instinct and you must learn when it is appropriate to trust one or the other."

Luke's mind was still cloudy with thoughts of Shira, and how her skin must've felt against his. "What?" He asked with a frown. "What do you mean?"

"Your feelings can be your greatest assets, but they can be manipulated against you. Like a flimsiplast, folded upon itself in a jagged, haphazard manner, until reconciling the edges is utterly impossible..."

Vader dismantled the pyramid with an absent gesture, causing all the stones to levitate in the air, before forming a diamond that twisted and rotated spectacularly.

"...and a loss of control is inevitable." The diamond collapsed on itself, the stones crushing together with a loud clap and vibrant sparks. He cast the stones aside with another wave of the hand. "Be mindful of your dealings with Brie. There is no greater manipulator than a beautiful woman."

"But...I thought she was your friend."

"Yes, _my_ student, _my_ friend," Vader said. "That does not mean she is yours by extension."

"Who is she, exactly?"

"I never intended on taking an apprentice, a real apprentice, because I knew that after your father died, I would never have a collaborator as powerful...at least, until I learned that you were alive." Vader paused. "So, I took Brie in when she was young and have trained her to be my servant."

"Just as you were a servant of the Emperor?"

The Dark Lord shrugged. "Even minions have minions."

Luke's expression hardened. How could he regard her so nonchalantly, even after she'd served him for years? "Is that I'm supposed to be?" Luke asked. "Another minion?"

"No." Vader pushed his palm forward as though he were using it to absorb blaster bolts. "Brie is powerful. But it takes far more than power to rule. She has her uses-strengths which deserve application-but she has little future beyond that."

"And how do I know that for sure?" Luke asked. "How do I know that I'm not destined to be just another tool in your box of tricks? How do I know that you're not just using me?"

"Because...you are the son of Skywalker."

He shook his head at what was Vader's catch-all answer.

"You still don't understand, do you? The importance of your heritage? The power in your blood? An entire generation of Jedi believed that your father was the chosen one, destined to bring balance to the Force, to bring order to the Galaxy. I was one of them. You would not believe the fathom of despair I felt when I believed that your father and his entire line was severed. But you are here. You are alive. I teach you because I must. In fewer words, _I_ am _your_ servant. I am trying to restore the most precious thing you will ever know: your birthright."

Again, Luke found himself looking at the floor as Vader paced across the training floor. "But what does this have to do with Shira?"

"She was a stand-in for you." The significance of the statement sunk in as Vader paused. "A sub-par replacement, whose very place here is called to question by your arrival."

And Luke understood. Why she was constantly teasing and ridiculing him, taking every opportunity to jab an elbow in his ribs, even though she did it with a playful smile or a facetious grin. Why she remained a hermetically sealed void, with nothing but echoes surrounding her aura.

Echoes...of fear. She was afraid of him, and of what his presence here meant.

But was he afraid of her? His mind gave him a thousand reasons to be wary, all supported by axioms whose logic was as undeniable as Vader's teachings. But his instincts...his instincts told him that she could be trusted, that she was his friend, even though she had not yet realized it herself.

* * *

><p>Shira Brie didn't like to think of herself as a compulsive murderer. Assassination was an art far more refined than the senseless killing that goes on in the fog of war. She had spent many years learning this art from her master and honing all of the skills and planning and patience it required.<p>

Yet there were times when all of that had to be thrown out on an impulse. Times when her urges were too strong to temper with diligent planning or patient execution. Moments when the stress of her existence was too high and the only way to cope was tojust reach out and _kill_ someone.

This was why she was hiding in one of the dark corners of Mauxell Shrti's apartment, waiting for him to return so she could do to him what she does best.

Would her master approve of this? Probably not. She didn't know anything about Mauxell Shrti, except that someone with fifty thousand credits wanted him dead. She didn't know what he had done to deserve such a bounty, if he was dangerous or if he could be armed. She was going against everything Vader had taught her. Worse: she was deviating from her assignment to make this kill.

Shira couldn't keep any of those factors in mind, though, with the cold whisper from the dark begging for a kill. The diabolic voice was ever present, pestering her while she was out on missions, begging her to commit violence, hungering for blood.

It was at times like this, when she was in genuine crisis, that she couldn't afford to ignore him anymore and sating his hunger became her top priority. Feeding that hunger was...difficult. After all, her visitor gleaned no satisfaction from the precise, orderly kills she made in Vader's service. The whole methodology of assassination, with its meticulous planning and detailed contingencies, was all too...sterile for him.

No, her visitor was too rambunctious for all that. He enjoyed spontaneity and messiness, the wild thrill that came from just picking someone off the street and yanking the life out of them.

Shira closed her eyes and scratched the back of her neck. How much longer until Mauxell got back so she could kill him? The anticipation was what usually made these impulse-kills so hair-raising and exciting. But all she felt right now was blank impatience. Something else was weighing heavily on her shoulders. The voice wasn't the only distraction she had to deal with.

Thoughts of her new rival, Skywalker, hung over her like a bleak shadow. Why, why did he have to show up and complicate her otherwise simple life? She was used to a solitary existence. Sleeping with another person in the room was difficult. Especially when she found herself unable to peel her eyes from his face. Something about his boyish looks was incredibly appealing.

She had stayed on Baraxis for a week, watching Skywalker as he slagged through Vader's trials and exercises. His development in the Force was beyond quick-it was meteoric. He was learning at such a quick rate that it was beginning to frighten her. How could she keep pace with-much less stay ahead of-someone so immensely talented? She was beginning to wonder if, when fully trained, Luke could overtake Vader in raw strength.

The thought made her shudder with fear. Vader was the definition of strength-this was the basis of her reality, of her view of the universe. Vader had protected her when she was weak and nurtured and cultivated her until she was strong enough to stand beside him and help him fight his enemies.

If this...farm boy could somehow overtake Vader, then he would have to be stopped. All the nagging questions she had about his origins and his life would have to be tabled, as would this...attraction. Strange, she had never felt herself truly attracted to anyone before-and that was to be expected, after all, those feelings would be so...antithetical to her nature, after all the ordeals she had endured.

Yes, she was divorced from that aspect of humanity, as her master was-again, one of the reasons she respected him so. All the teasing banter and the seductive tricks she'd learned over the years were smokescreens, used to manipulate her prey and disguise her asexual nature.

But this feeling, this attraction was real. There had to be a reason for that. Was it simply his power? His talent? After all, her Force sense perceived him as beacon, a vibrant, wild flame in the Force. Was it possible that she wasn't so much attracted to him as she was _attuned_ to the wavelength his aura emitted?

She shook off the questions, refusing to conflate her goals with her impulses. His very existence as Vader's _new_ apprentice called to question her existence as the old. She would have to act at the next opportunity; his powers were growing too quickly to do otherwise.

That's why she was here. Not just to feed the voice, but to sharpen her resolve.

Shira looked up as she sensed a sentient life form approach through the Force. The locking mechanisms in the front door opened with a series of clicks and the door slid open with a slight screech. Good. No more waiting. Now was the time.

Mauxell absently walked past Shira and into the kitchen. The Sith reached for the metal coil that hung from her belt. Situations like this reminded her of why she treasured her lightwhip so much: in a pinch, it could be used as a garrote.

Shira snuck up behind him as he opened the conservator, her footsteps completely silenced by her cushioned moccasins. She threw a section of the lightwhip out in front of him and yanked hard. The coil whipped closed and completely circumferenced his neck.

The garrote silenced Mauxell's scream. He struggled violently, uselessly trying to pry the whip off of his neck with his fingers. Shira propped her elbows up against his shoulder blades to increase her leverage and further tighten the ligature. He tried to charge backwards and slam her into a wall, but he only managed to push her into a counter, where she hit and knocked over the nanowave.

His struggling slowly weakened until he passed out and slumped onto the floor. She stood over him, quizzical expression on her face as she considered how best to do kill him. She had already scoured the apartment for kill tools some time ago: it contained quite a few, from the obvious (the vibro-blade cooking utensils in the kitchen) to the improvised (the hammers and other similar blunt devices in the tool box under the sink). Of course, she had her own weapons, a lightsaber, a lightwhip and a blaster, to choose from.

But none of those appealed to her. Blasters were boring and conventional. Lightsabers left clean, cauterized cuts, the sort that didn't appeal to her visitor's ghastly desires. The lightwhip, she'd already used in some capacity as a garrote. As for the hammers...well, she wasn't in the mood for crushing through bone.

Ultimately, she decided on using the single-edged blade she kept in her boot. Small and sharp, she was confident it could make enough of a mess. Unlike the vibro-blades her victim kept in the kitchen, a knife requires strength and precision to use. There was something about the visceral feeling of having to slice through flesh unassisted that she found deeply appealing.

As she knelt over her soon-to-be victim, both hands tightly clasping the handle of her blade, the adrenalin surged. She closed her eyes and tried to savor the feeling.

Then, with one swift motion, she plunged the ten-centimeter blade into mister Shrti's chest, cutting through the chest bone and cleanly severing the pulmonary artery. The sheer volume of bloodshed was...satisfying, to say the least. He went from unconscious to dead in seconds.

She pulled the knife out and rose to her feet, breathing a sigh of relief as she appreciated the departure of her now-sated visitor. In time, he would come back - he _always_ came back, that's why she was always checked the "wanted: dead" section of every bounty office she came across. Still, she was happy to bid him farewell, at least for now.

She had some real work to do. And fifty thousand credits to collect.


	15. Chapter 13

a/n: thanks everyone for staying with this story, despite my long absence. I appreciate all of the reviews and follows and am glad that you are enjoying my story.

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><p>By the time Shira got to the bounty office, the body had already been hauled off by the authorities. She had called the incident in to the local EMS after leaving, posing as a "concerned neighbor" who heard a "violent scuffle" next door. Collecting a bounty on a body already in the morgue was much easier than providing some other burden of proof to the head collector.<p>

With the fifty thousand cred in pocket, Shira took the L-train across town to the longshoreman's guild within the industrial starport. Once there, she made a considerable payment to the inside man that smuggled in a crate for her. After that, she went to rendezvous with her contact at Ulzighet cafe. The Tarisi-as this particular syndicate of rebels against Imperial authority liked to call themselves-were certainly thorough when it came to security. She had to pass through four different coded conversations before a barmaid admitted her to the secret room downstairs.

The secret room organized like a command center, with wall-mounted displays and maps with scale models representing Imperial troop placements and estimates. There were models of the planet, its moons in orbit and the Star Destroyers patrolling its system. Crates of what she presumed were munitions were stacked neatly in one corner.

The Tarisian resistance was unlike other resistance movements against the Empire because it was so amoral by nature. Every other resistance made some grandstanding philosophy as part of their rebellion: the Corellians have their honor, the Alderaani their pacifism, the Chandrilans their idealism. On Taris, such notions are ludicrous. The Tarisians don't have honor or codes or laws; they have bosses and syndicates and gangs-all manifestations of the pervasive culture of violence and might makes right that has incubated on Taris since that world was young.

Shira knew these things because she was from Taris.

The Tarisi were as likely to bomb a civilian supply depot servicing an Imperial base as they were to bomb the Imperial base itself. They would frequently conduct terrorist attacks and had no qualms about assassinating Imperial officials-civilian or military-or their families. Kidnap and ransom was part of their standard fare, as well as spice trafficking and whore mongering.

Though the Tarisians had many connections through the galaxy-spanning syndicate of crime and vice, the majority of their influence was limited to Taris and its adjacent systems.

This planet, Rylin, was in one of those adjacent systems and happened to be the Imperial Bastion of the Ojoster sector. Maximilian Veers and his rogue fleet of Star Destroyers' pillaging of the sectors adjacent to Ojoster had dramatically increased Rylin's importance. Where Rylin had once been a sleepy munitions base, it was now being used as a staging area for tens of thousands of imperial troops and a rally point for several Star Destroyer squadrons. From the command center in the starport at the center of the city, Grand Moff Rhezar oversaw all Imperial assets in the sector.

Shira turned when a red togruta beckoned her over. He was seated in one of the booths next to the munitions stockpile with two humans and a twi'lek.

"So, you're Brisha Syo?" The Togruta asked. The tilt of his lip told her that he wasn't impressed.

One of the humans, the man with a gruff beard that only partly covered a pock-marked face, Shira could recognize as Dahro Haggar, master of a large undercity region called the Scar. He's become the most powerful of the Vice Lords, since Maygar Venustas was detained at Hapes several weeks ago.

According to the rumors, the first Vice Lord was trying to secure an alliance with the Consortium. Why he thought that the Hapans would ever consent to such a thing was beyond her.

Shira looked back at the togruta and shrugged. "Were you expecting something else?"

The other human, a man with long hair and copper skin, said, "someone more ferocious looking. A bothan perhaps."

There were times when Shira wished she had been born male, if only so that these militant warrior-types would give her more respect. Of course, if she had been born male, she would not have survived her rough upbringing in the Tarisian undercity. Besides, there was a definite strategic advantage in being routinely underestimated.

"Borsk said you gentlemen needed killing," Shira said as she took the empty seat in the booth. "He wouldn't have sent me if he didn't think I was the best."

The twi'lek and the togruta traded a look before the twi'lek glanced up at her. "I suppose we should be grateful he sent anyone," the twi'lek said while placing one of his blue hands on the table, "after all, this is the only time that the Alliance has ever agreed to aid us-"

"The Alliance?" the long-haired man mused, "or Borsk Fey'lya?"

The twi'lek chuckled. "Ah yes, sometimes I forget that the two can be entirely different things and may even have opposing interests... tell me, miss Syo, which agenda does your master favor at the moment?"

She flashed an insolent smile. "You think I can speak for Borsk Fey'lya?"

"Then what about the rest of your high command?" Dahro Haggar asked. "Has Wilhuff Tarkin broken the Alliance so thoroughly that they would resort to a band of brigands and cutthroats like us?"

Shira knew all about the historical enmity between the Tarisians and the Alliance. It dated all the way back to the days of the days of the Old Republic, when Mon Mothma slapped Senator Maygar Venustas and called him a thief and a whoremonger. The Tarisians could care less for the derision of their Alderaani, Chandrilan and Corellian counterparts. They fought the empire for their own reasons.

"Go on, don't be coy," Haggar said. "Tell us, what do the top bosses of the Alliance think of this contract killing you've come here to do on our behalf? Has Mon Mothma really decided to start getting her hands dirty for once?"

"Alliance?" Shira looked as confused as she should have been. She had spent nearly a quarter of her life building up the name and reputation of Brisha Syo. She knew, instinctively, how to separate the things she knew from the things Brisha was supposed to know. "I don't know anything about that. I'm independent. Borsk contracts me through spynet."

Haggar snickered and the togruta shook his head. The togruta said, "does the left lek now know what the right is doing?"

Haggar was laughing outright now. "Never underestimate a bothan. The tunes are shifting, the teams are changing rosters, the chairs are being shuffled around-and he's already learning a different dance."

The twi'lek pounded a fist on the table. "Just as I thought, then! Fey'lya tires of sitting behind Mon Mothma. Our time has come!"

Shira frowned as the long-haired human cheered and toasted the Vice Lord and the Tarisi resistance with a flask he produced from his pocket. One by one the others each took a sip and Shira could only wonder exactly what it was that they knew that she did not yet.

The togruta straightened after taking a long swig. "You'll find the armaments you requested in there."

"You followed all my order specifications?"

"To a tee," Haggar said. "We had to go out of our way to a lot of obscure shops back home to find some of the pieces and parts you were looking for. So please, don't make a mess of things..."

Shira nodded and stood to grab the crate.

"Assassin!" Haggar shouted.

She turned to face him, crate in hand.

"When you return to your employer for payment I'd like you to deliver a message for us." He lowered the flask from his lips. "Tell Borsk Fey'lya that the tides are changing. Taris is armored with credits and fleets and allies. A reformation is coming. He and his bothan kin would be welcome to sit at our table."

. . .

Now, she was back to where she started-the starport. Like any other starport on an Outer-Rim world, the structure was sprawling and spaced out, with hundreds of open-air runways, terminals and all the convenience stores and restaurants that could reasonably fit in between. It was a far-cry from the supermassive, skyscraping starports of more developed worlds.

However, there was one large building that dominated the skyline and that was Rhezar's command center. It was a ten-story spire walled off from the rest of the starport by a six-meter high, two-meter wide wall. And she knew it inside out. A legion of stormtroopers were garrisoned within and at any given time there were three AT-ATs patrolling its perimeter and courtyard. Lambda-class shuttles were constantly landing on or taking off from the spire's six landing pads, ferrying command crews from the spire to the Star Destroyers in orbit up above.

Security was airtight, with one exception: the longshoremen's guild had access. That's why she had paid a man in the guild to unload a package in the building. The bomb she had placed within that crate would make for a wonderful diversion. It contained enough flammable material to start a large fire, enough white phosphorous to produce massive amounts of smoke, and enough ionized plasma to cause an electromagnetic pulse strong enough to disrupt some of the command center's more sensitive security systems. Now, it was just a matter of timing.

Shira walked to the civilian fuel station closest to the command center. It was situated just under a guard tower where four Imperial Army Troopers stood watch with their rifles and a sentry gun. She walked into the fuel station's convenience store and started casually mulling through the snacks that were for sale. At that point she received a message from her inside man, who reported that he and his team had just finished unloading everything-her shipment included-and were leaving the base.

She took a deep breath, as she always did before executing one of her well-laid plans, then checked her timepiece. If the Grand Moff was maintaining his schedule he would be reviewing tactical reports in his briefing room, right in the heart of the spire. She thumbed through several screens on her comm before sending off a call to the mobile she'd attached to the bomb.

Moments later, a sonic boom echoed through small convenience store. She and the store clerk both ran outside to see a pillar of thick black smoke rising from the north face of the spire. Orange flames licked at some of the exposed superstructure. The men in the guard tower overhead were shocked at the sight, cursing at each other as they fumbled over their desk, looking for a comlink to phone their commander.

Shira nodded. It was against this chaotic backdrop that she would have her way with Grand Moff Rhezar. All according to plan.

Without another thought, she sprinted back into the convenience store and grabbed the white crate Tech had given her. Within the crate, underneath all of the cushioned packing beads that ensured "safe" shipping and handling, was a fully-assembled, heavily modified Mer-Sonn SSR-47 Sonic rifle with a with an affixed wave disperser. She slung the rifle over her shoulder and activated her personal cloaking device as she ran out to scale the guard tower.

She slipped past the four guards easily. Being invisible to the naked eye certainly had its advantages. The sensors that her cloaking device couldn't evade had been taken offline by the EMP blast of the bomb. After she cleared the guardhouse, she ran south along the wall, towards the landing pad that hung low off the south face of the spire. The landing pad that was used exclusively for housing Rhezar's personal shuttle. She primed her rifle as the landing pad and the shuttle came into view, then fell to a steady crouch as she got direct sight of the shuttle's entry ramp.

She checked every part of her weapon, specifically ensuring that the wave disperser was attached correctly. The disperser modified some of the sound waves produced by the blasts, so that each blast would sound as though it came from all directions, rather than just along the shooter's trajectory. It was essential to maintaining her cover, to say the least.

This modified SSR-47 was much more powerful than the retail version, which was only meant to stun or incapacitate its targets. This weapon was capable of expending several thousand kilograms of force in one blast, enough power to turn a human being into a human stain.

Grand Moff Rhezar emerged from the spire with several of his handlers, the look on his face showing that he was clearly annoyed by this brazen attack on his headquarters. Shira took careful aim down the iron sights, patiently waiting for a clean shot as he took the time to scream at and berate one of his handlers. The clean shot finally came a few moments later, when Rhezar tried to board his shuttle.

Shira squeezed the trigger, and what was left of Rhezar splattered unceremoniously across the hull of his ship. She lowered her weapon and took a moment to admire the veritable work of art it had produced across the underside of the shuttle. What a beautiful, surreal portrait all of that coagulated blood made...

She tapped the rifle's grip with her trigger finger several times before slinging it over her shoulder and preparing to rappel down the wall. She had just discovered a new ranged weapon of choice.

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><p>The entire city was chaos as Shira made her way out. A general alarm had gone out and klaxons were sounding around the city. The squads of stormtroopers she encountered were in a state of confusion. Many were breaking ranks and searching for their commanders to obtain new orders.<p>

She had little doubt that this was what the Tarisi intended-after all, lines of succession are hardly ever clear in the Empire and they get blurrier the higher up the ladder you go. It would certainly take hours-if not days-for the Imperials here to sort out which moffling among them would take Rhezar's place as commander of the bastion.

But why would the Tarisi have arranged for such a killing now? At first she thought that they had timed the assassination to coincide with a riot or uprising-but this was not the case, as the city had not fallen to madness. Besides, an uprising would hardly be effective here, where the imperial garrison outnumbered the civilian population almost two to one.

It wasn't until she got into her ship, flew out into orbit and started preparing to jump to lightspeed that she realized just what plans the Tarisi had hatched.

There were five new star destroyers above the planet, all of them attacking the three that had been standing guard in geosynchronous orbit. The lead ship of this assault force was the Imperial Star Destroyer _Tyrant_, otherwise known as General Veers' flagship...

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><p>Luke emerged from his quarters expecting another day of physical training. All the days spent under Lord Vader's tutelage that thus far been brutal and exhaustive. Yesterday, he was made to go through saber drills against several remotes with a one hundred fifty pound pack of stones on his back. The day before, Vader made him run a gauntlet of obstacles and training droids with his feet bound together. But when he got to the training room today, all he saw was Vader, waiting expectantly, arms folded over his chest.<p>

"Come," he said, "it is time that you met our advisors."

Luke nodded, partly bewildered, then followed. The hallway to Vader's end of the cliff side den terminated in a atrium that led to three separate rooms-a workshop, a sleeping room and a refresher. Vader walked into the workshop, which was littered with piles that were junked medical droids. R2 was in a work bench in the corner, set to the task of constructing a new ones. The droid whistled a greeting before turning back to its own work.

"Do you still mistrust me?" Vader asked.

Luke frowned. "Master...?"

Vader paced to the comm at the console on the far end of the workshop and depressed a button to activate the transmission. Life-size projections of four decorated imperial officers appeared as Vader sat down. Luke stood behind Vader as the four respectfully bowed.

"Gentlemen," Vader said, matching their waist-deep bows with a curt nod. "This is my apprentice and heir, Luke Skywalker."

The first officer on the right, an older man with gray-white hair and a thick white mustache bowed to Luke. "Lord Skywalker," he said. "Colonel Wullf Yularen. I served with your father during the Clone Wars. He was...a great man."

Luke remembered reading about Yularen in the files. He had been the commander of his father's flagship more than twenty years ago. Now, it would appear that Yularen was Vader's spy aboard the Death Star.

"Good day, Lord Skywalker," the man left of Yularen also bowed. He was clothed in the more traditional gray uniform, with dozens of medals pinned beneath his simple, two-bar rank insignia. "I am Grand Moff Raynor. I shall serve you as faithfully as I serve Lord Vader."

Luke nodded.

"Lord Skywalker." The next man bowed likewise. "I am Admiral Colsan. I look forward to productive collaborations with you. Together, we will bring Palpatine to justice for his crimes."

"Yes, Admiral, we will," Luke said.

The last man also bowed with a depth and fullness that exceeded that of his colleagues. "I am General Veers," he said as he rose. "Your father was my commanding officer at the battle of Carida nineteen years ago. He saved my life. I am honored to serve you as I once served him."

That made two men who had once served his father, now swearing loyalty to him. Luke couldn't help but wonder if this was one of the benefits that the Sith had over the Jedi: they had retainers. "Thank you, General."

"Where shall we begin?" Vader asked.

"My men have interrogated the traitor, Ozzel," Veers said. "We were able to extract information from him before I traded him to the rebels."

"As would be expected," Vader said. "Ozzel was always weak."

Veers nodded. "He's given up a lot of intel on Tarkin's fleet positions."

"Excellent," Colsan said, stroking his goatee thoughtfully. "We could use this to raise a first strike."

"Yes, but open war is not something we want to risk," Yularen said.

"I disagree. I grow tired of waiting. The destruction of Alderaan and Tarrth has put Imperial morale at an all-time low. If we wish to exploit the popular sentiment against the Emperor, then we must act now-"

"But on whose accord?" Raynor asked. "Lord Vader is our leader, but, and I say this with all due respect, my lord, he is not a public man. If we were to launch an open crusade against the Emperor, it would be upon the credit of our own individual names. And we are not public men, either."

"That is correct, Grand Moff," Vader said. "And that is why General Veers has been set to his task. The Rebel Alliance commands an air of righteousness in the hearts and minds of ordinary people. General Veers has seen an opportunity to seize control of the Rebel Alliance and use them as our figurehead for rallying popular support against the Emperor. General, please brief the rest of the Council and my Apprentice."

"I have made arrangements with Borsk Fey'lya, a leader of the Bothan resistance. He is presenting to Mon Mothma the case for our...absorption into the Alliance."

"Give it time," Colsan said with a smirk. "They'll still think you're a motherless ogre...but they'll start to see you as _their_ motherless ogre."

Veers' smile showed very limited sense of amusement. "Either way, there are powerful personalities in the Alliance that must be neutralized. People whose following with the Alliance rank-and-file is too great to be co-opted."

"We'll make martyrs of them in time." Vader nodded sharply.

Luke couldn't believe what he was hearing. This couldn't be right. The leaders of the Alliance fought for freedom and democracy. They were decent people. How could these men-two of whom had served directly with his father-be so casual about seeking their deaths?

"But you should leave that to me," Vader said. "Killing them now would leave us with little to gain. Focus on the task at hand. Earn their trust."

"I will," Veers said resolutely.

"Controlling the Rebels is but one step toward controlling the galaxy, but it will be some time, General," Vader said. "Many pieces have yet to move into place. We still have to purge our ranks of loyalists. I take it the three of you have made progress on that chore?"

All of them nodded, except for Raynor, who scratched his brow.

"Grand Moff?" Vader asked.

"There is a traitor in my chain," Raynor said. "He's been feeding information to Palpatine. Nothing too damning or damaging-I've only given him bad information, but my spies recovering it on the other end has confirmed him as the leak. I have a man in his house, courageous enough to spy but unfortunately too squeamish to kill."

Vader clenched one of his gloved fists. "His name and his location?"

"General Madryll Kulas, from Baraxis," Raynor said.

"My apprentice will bring him in," Vader said with a nod. "Gentlemen, you are dismissed."

Luke looked at the floor as the holograms disappeared, mind swimming at the breadth of the conspiracy he was now involved in. He looked up as he felt Vader's black gaze fall upon him, then immediately straightened his stance, afraid that Vader would see into his mind and detect his doubt.

"Do you understand your task?" Vader asked.

Luke nodded without thinking, willing to do anything to escape this room and get some fresh air.

"Go on then," Vader said. "Do not return until you have Kulas."


	16. Chapter 14

A/N: Wow, it's been quite a long time! I stopped updating because I got really, really busy IRL and ran out of time to work on this story. I would say that I still don't have enough time to finish it (would, really, really like to, though!) but I was going over my files and noticed that I still have another ten chapters or so already written, so I figured...what the hell! Post it! I'm gonna try to update once a week until I exhaust all my finished content. I hope you guys are still around to enjoy the story! It starts to get pretty, pretty interesting, I promise that!

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><p>Ahsoka paced in the main hold of the <em>Millennium Falcon<em> trying to stamp out the nervous energy accumulating in her bones. No matter how many times she went back-and-forth while Han maneuvered the Falcon to dock with _Home One_, could not get the thought of how colossally _bad_ an idea this was. Why, why, _why_ in the nine hells would Mon Mothma want to meet Han Solo?

It made no sense whatsoever, yet that was the word that came through in the orders that were transmitted to them when they cleared the galactic rim. _The Chief of Staff would like to personally debrief you and your mercenary retainer._ But what _kriffing_ for? Why would Mon Mothma _ever_ have to meet her "mercenary retainer?"

Ahsoka straightened her posture and rubbed her chest as a low _thud_ told her that the Falcon had just landed. Was there a reason why she was so nervous about this? She looked up as Han came out of the cockpit, side-by-side with Chewie. She looked at Chewie and smiled. She looked at Han and worried.

"I'm going to say it one more time," Ahsoka began.

Han sighed and rolled his eyes. "You said it _how_ many times since we got that comm? Ahsoka, I've got-"

"Be on your best behavior." She was poking her finger at him so close to his face that she might have taken an eye out. "I mean it, Han. Do you want to keep getting friendly contracts through me or not?"

"Alright, alright!" He said with that cocky shrug of his.

She shook her head, then triggered the loading ramp and turned and looked at Chewie, who just shrugged. Good. At least they had Chewie. His presence would partly make up for whatever Han did or said to put his foot in his mouth. These Rebel Alliance types love Wookies-they're all very aware of and sympathetic to the horrible ordeals Wookies have experienced under Imperial rule.

Mon Mothma was waiting for them at the bottom of the loading ramp, with Aileen Tahn and a handful of other aides that Ahsoka knew by face, but not by name. The aides all wore blue vest-suits similar in style to the ones white ones Mon Mothma wore when she was a Senator in the Old Republic. Mon Mothma herself wore a stately white gown with several Chandrilan pendants looped around her neck.

Ahsoka bowed slightly when she reached the bottom of the ramp, an action that Chewie did in unison but Han only followed, when he was already an awkward half-second late.

"Madam Chief of Staff," Ahsoka said.

"Master Jedi..." Mon Mothma's voice seemed weary. She looked at Han, then at Chewie, and leaned back as one of her aides whispered something in her ear. "I take it these are your retainers?"

Han took that as his cue. "Han Solo, Captain of the _Millennium Falcon_, your worshipfulness."

"_Excellency_ is the appropriate address for the Chief of State, _smuggler_," one of the aides preened.

"Oh," Han said. He forced a smile, then made another awkward bow. "I'm sor-forgive me. _Your excellency_."

Mon Mothma looked up and down with an expression that could be described as the very definition of displeasure. "Another Corellian. Just when I thought I'd been relieved of that particular problem."

Han's effort to restrain himself was visible.

"And who is this?" Mon Mothma asked, looking at the Wookie.

"This is my good friend Chewbacca," Ahsoka said with a smile.

Mon Mothma glared at Ahsoka. "Do you pay him out of our pocket too or is he a packaged part of the deal?"

Ahsoka frowned, then looked at Han who was giving her the most confused sideways glance. She looked back at Mon Mothma, her expression middling between alarm and outrage. Where was all this hostility coming from?

"Excuse me, your excellency," Ahsoka began, "but what's going on?"

"Are you aware of the...damage that's been done to our alliance recently?"

"Yavin? I was there."

"That was horrible, and I suppose what I'm referring to falls under the fallout of that defeat..." Mon Mothma closed her eyes and squeezed her fingers hard upon the bridge of her nose. The wrinkles on her forehead and around her eyes spoke of several agitated days of little to no sleep. "But, of course, you would know if you were ever in comm range."

Ahsoka straightened. "I was held up by Imperial Agents on Ansion-"

"Whatever the excuse, you should be more in the loop, Ahsoka. We give you a pretty big expense account and you just use it freely while running around the galaxy without bothering to check in on a regular basis."

Her face started to turn a deeper shade of orange. Was this why Han and Chewie had been called in? Did Mon Mothma want to chew her out in front of them?

"Your excellency, I've put in my fair share of work for this alliance-"

"Yes," Mon Mothma said, "and some of your brethren Jedi, most notably your apprentice, Zev Veers, make just as many contributions _without_ being a significant drain on our resources."

Ahsoka frowned. "Drain?"

Mon Mothma just glared at Han, then rolled her eyes. "And top it all off, now I can't even be certain of your loyalty."

"_Excuse me_?" Ahsoka screeched as though she'd been slapped. "And just what is that supposed to mean?"

"Garm Bel Iblis has left us," Mon Mothma said. "After two years of working together, of accomplishing so much, he decides to just lose his temper and walk out." Ahsoka could see the jaw muscles on the Chief of Staff's face tightening, the wrinkles on her face quivering with displeasure. "Never mind the sacrifices that were made to get us this far, the people that died to unite our our resistances, and Bail Organa, who's been martyred, along with the rest of his blessed planet for our cause...and that kriffing Bantha herder spits on it all by just _walking_ out on our Alliance!"

"Hey!" Han finally shouted, unable to take any more. "Garm Bel Iblis is a hero-"

"Shut up!" Ahsoka snapped without bothering to look at him. "What in the nine hells happened while I was gone?"

"We had an Advisory Council meeting," Mon Mothma began, "halfway through, Garm stands up and claims that there was a leak of the mission details to Toprawa, that that is the only way to explain how everything went so wrong and why so many of his men and Bria Tharen were killed there. Then he turned and accused me, said that I was responsible-"

"Well, are you?" Han interjected.

Ahsoka glared at him again and he backed off.

"-and that is nonsense, of course," Mon Mothma said. "There isn't even any proof that there was a leak."

Ahsoka shrugged. "It would be a reasonable explanation-there doesn't seem to be any other way the mission could have gone that wrong and the imperials could have gotten that big of an upper hand on us otherwise."

Mon Mothma scoffed. "So you believe him?"

"I didn't say I thought you were responsible. Just that maybe we _should_ look into the possibility of a leak." Ahsoka took a breath. "Now, what would ever lead you to question my loyalties?"

"You came into this alliance with Garm, remember? Now he's gone. Not just him personally, but he's taken everything-every last soldier, every last ship, everything even remotely Corellian. All we have left now are a half-dozen Mon Cal cruisers."

"So...You think I'd just go with him?"

Mon Mothma frowned as though the jump in logic wasn't so presumptuous. "Why not? You came in with him, and now that he's stormed off to form his own, separate _Corellian_ independence movement..."

"In case you don't remember, Zev came in with _me_. We were both under Garm's banner back then. Judging from the how highly you speak of him, I'm guessing you did not have this same conversation."

"That's different. I know Zev. I've worked with him countless times in the past two years and he is dedicated to the Alliance. I don't know you. I can count on one hand the number of times I've personally met with you since the the treaty was signed. All that I really know about you is that you were Anakin Skywalker's apprentice and that Senator Amidala had a particular fondness for you. Neither of those is a particularly positive commendation for your jacket."

Ahsoka had to will her veins to pump ice. If her blood got any hotter, then she just might have acted on the gnawing urge to stab the Chief through the eye with an icicle.

"Furthermore, you run through your expense account like a shaak in heat. For what? For this?" She pointed at Han incredulously. "I never bothered with it in the past, because Garm vouched for you, and when he wasn't convincing enough, Bail did too. But now they're gone. It's time for an audit."

Ahsoka took a breath and exhaled her anger the way Siri had taught her. "I assure you, Mon Mothma, that my loyalties are to the Republic, and to this Alliance, which is our best chance at restoring it. Now, if you don't like the company I keep, then I'm sorry, because there's nothing you can do to change that."

"I can defund you, Ahsoka."

"You can. That's your decision. But I'll tell you right now that you would regret it. Han Solo and Chewbacca are excellent assets to the Rebellion-"

"Really?" Mon Mothma asked. "I'd like to put that to the test. I have a mission, for all of you."

"Then let's hear it, sister," Han said.

"As your Apprentice has no doubt told you by now, he has an informant that wants to defect."

"You know about Cyano?" Ahsoka asked.

"Crix Madine?" Mon Mothma nodded. "Well he wants to come in, together with all of his men, several of his colleagues and all of _their_ men. A lot these guys are former flag officers of Darth Vader's personal fleet."

Ahsoka frowned. This was the first time she was hearing any of this. "Flag officers like who?"

"Xamuel Lennox, Lorrth Needa, Maximilian Veers..."

"_Veers_?"

"Yes, I was equally surprised when Zev told me," Mon Mothma said. "I thought he would have been happy about his father switching sides. He could not have been more displeased to be telling me about it."

"Well, you don't know about what happened between Zev and his father," Ahsoka replied.

Mon Mothma raised her brows dismissively. "These officers and their men have basically become homeless. They want nothing to do with Tarkin's little death machine and they've become a pariah within their own military since Vader died-"

"Vader's not dead."

"Well that's what Madine said, and he's proven, time and time again, to be a very consistent source-"

"Madine's wrong."

"All of our independent intel seems to confirm-"

"Listen to me!" Ahsoka barked. "You think I wouldn't know if Vader was dead? You think I, of all people, wouldn't sense it? He's _alive_."

"Either way, those officers want to switch sides. And the work that they've been putting in-sacking Imperial outposts up and down the Isond sector, taking out Star Destroyer and frigate patrols, recruiting new rebels to the cause-proves a lot about their sincerity."

"And that's the mission?" Han asked, his voice dry. "You want us to just fly up to some rogue star fleet and ask to talk to the General in charge?"

"No, I want to you to take me to meet with General Madine and his comrades," Mon Mothma said as she paced closer to the Falcon. The Chief of State raised a hand and ran it under the ship's jagged, scarred ventral hull. "I want to see exactly what seven hundred fifty credits a week for the past two years has been paying for."

Han and Ahsoka exchanged a look while Chewie growled a protest.

The trip from _Home_ _One_ to the rogue Death Squadron fleet was short and bumpy-as all those trips through wild space tend to be. Ahsoka spent most of the trip holed up in Han's cabin, trying to hide out from Mon Mothma and her three aides. This rendezvous with Zev's father was a colossally _bad_ idea. Mon Mothma had no idea just _who_ she was about to get into bed with. The only reason Ahsoka agreed to come was to babysit the negotiations and try as hard as she could to steer them _away_ from an alliance.

Not she had much of a chance at even accomplishing that. Mon Mothma had made her opinions abundantly in their discussion on _Home One_. After their little discussion in the landing bay, Ahsoka went around the rest of the ship, to get a better pulse for what was going on in the remnants of the Alliance. With Bail and Garm gone, the whole organization was firmly under Mon Mothma's control. The Advisory Council was suspended and everyone that wasn't privy to Mon Mothma's way of thinking had been sent into hiding.

Ahsoka had no allies left. Maybe Mon Mothma was right to doubt her loyalty. Maybe she would be better off following Garm Bel Iblis. Or returning to the enclave on Naboo and biding her time with the younglings there. If her brethren ever needed her there, it was probably now more than ever, especially since Obi-Wan and Ferus had just been killed.

Before she could even consider an action like that, she had to at least come along and see for herself what Mon Mothma and her aides decided to do. Ahsoka owed that much to the Alliance.

When they landed aboard _Tyrant_, Ahsoka made sure to be the first one out. She shuffled past Mon Mothma's aides to see Maximilian Veers, Xamuel Lennox and Crix Madine standing at attention with a squad of stormtroopers at their back. The look on Veers' face shifted almost imperceptibly: Ahsoka thought she saw a strain of weariness in his eyes as he caught her gaze. His expression straightened almost as quickly, steamrolling whatever that was that she saw beneath a renewed sabacc face.

Mon Mothma and her aides followed not long after and began exchanging pleasantries with the Imperial Defectors. Ahsoka told Han and Chewie to wait on the Falcon. For once, Han didn't have to be told twice. Veers met her eye when she turned from the Falcon and approached the group.

"Ahsoka Tano?" Veers said with a questioning look. "Is that you?"

"Yes," Ahsoka said with a nod. "It is I."

An easy smile came to his lips. "I thought it was you. I haven't seen you since the Battle of the Belles, almost twenty-one years ago. You were just a Padawan, then."

"Oh, General, Ahsoka Tano is a Jedi Master now," one of Mon Mothma's aides, a spindly woman named Aileen Tahn, said, "In fact, she trained your son in the Jedi Arts."

Ahsoka would've given anything to slap that woman across the face right now. She turned from the aide then to Veers. If he was surprised-and he _had_ to be, there was no way he could have known-then he did a good job of hiding it. His lips pursed slightly as he nodded.

"I always know my son would amount to something great someday," Veers said.

"So you think being a Jedi is akin to being great?" Ahsoka asked.

Veers nodded as though he was confirming that water was wet. "Master Tano, yours is an honorable order-"

"So honorable you helped Darth Vader exterminate us?" Ahsoka asked through her teeth.

More remarkable than the gasps from Mon Mothma's aides or the stares from Lennox and Madine was Veers' reaction-or rather, lack of one. The General's expression was one of stone. A stone that doesn't forgive or forget or apologize, or even remember.

"Master Jedi," Madine began, "we've all done things we regret. You _know_ this-"

"Yes, General Madine, we do," Ahsoka said, "but some of us have done far more than others."

Veers started straightening the cuffs of his uniform. Despite their defection, all three officers were still dressed in the trappings of their former offices. They even had service medals pinned to their jackets.

"Where is my son?" Veers asked as he looked away from Ahsoka and towards Mon Mothma. "I was under the impression that he would be here."

Before Mon Mothma could speak, Ahsoka interjected, "He's not here because he doesn't want anything to do with you-"

"That is enough! Master Tano, you are out of line!" Mon Mothma snapped. "General Veers, I'm sorry-"

"No, no, it's alright-there's no need for apologies, Your Excellency," Veers said as he turned to meet Ahsoka's glare once more. "I don't know what Zevulon has told either of you, but I know that I've made some poor decisions about his upbringing and he's come to resent me for it. I understand that-"

Ahsoka shook her head. "That doesn't excuse-"

"I didn't ask to be excused." Veers' face was a hard as durasteel. "Not that you could excuse me if I wanted to be, Master Jedi. That matter is between me and my son."

"He's never going to talk to you."

Veers didn't bat an eyelash. "If that is his choice, then so be it. But I don't think that you or the Chief came here to discuss my family affairs."

"Of course, General," Mon Mothma said. "What did you want to discuss?"

"Terms for an alliance," Madine said.

Lennox added, "We wanted to know a good place to start."

"The truth would be helpful," Mon Mothma said.

"Truth?" Madine asked after giving Veers a dubious look. "And what truth would that be?"

"It would be good to know all that you've done. Here is what I would ask of you: a written or auditory account of all the wrong that you and your officers have done while in Imperial service. Every military action you participated in that resulted in wrongful deaths or catastrophic losses of life or destruction of property."

"Confessions for your crimes," Aileen said.

The two Generals exchanged a look. "What for?" Veers asked. "So that you can prosecute us when a new government is formed?"

"No, General," Mon Mothma said, "So that we can have a list of everything to pardon you for."

Lennox's eyes narrowed. "Chief, we've taken a pretty big risk and put our lives on the line to come all the way out here and present you with a fleet and an army. Given what we're willing to offer you, how can you turn around and ask us for _this_?"

Ahsoka felt them through the Force. Lennox's incredulity and Madine's cold anger were both set against Mon Mothma, who exuded a confidence and righteousness unfitting an unarmed guest aboard a warship. And between them, herself and Mon Mothma's equally self-righteous aides, was Veers.

"The three of you are, to the rank and file of our alliance, marked men," Mon Mothma said. "You've committed atrocities that only Tarkin and Palpatine can match. If you think that you can just shed that image and we can take you into our service lightly, then you're mistaken. Before we can have an alliance, we must have accountability. The crimes of the Empire must be brought to light."

Madine was going to protest and let all that anger come rushing out, but Veers stopped him. Unlike the others, Ahsoka couldn't touch his mind through the Force. Sure, she could sense him, but he was just...there. There, and nothing else. There was no emotion, no disposition, no mood. It was as though his mind was entirely closed off.

And there was no way that a layman, not sensitive to the Force, could be that closed off to it. Unless he had been specifically trained to close himself off.

"We understand, Your Excellency," Veers said.

"Very well," Mon Mothma said. "Is there anything else or should we return when you have prepared those accounts?"

"Actually," Veers said, "Before we broke away from the fleet, we seized Kendal Ozzel. He served as Lord Vader's Fleet Admiral and he has been a spy for Emperor Palpatine for a much longer time. We would like to give him to you as a token of good faith."

Madine gave Veers an incredulous look and Ahsoka felt a pang of alarm from Lennox as well, but Veers ignored them both as he continued, "We've also prepared a briefing for you: a small sample of all that we know about the Emperor's forces, fleet positions and strongholds. As you can imagine, we have, in our time of service to the throne, amassed quite a bit of strategic information that I'm sure the Alliance will find useful."

"No need for a briefing just yet, General," Mothma said, "a compiled into a report for High Command would suffice."

Veers nodded. "I'll have my aide compress the full tactical details into a file."

The walk to the detention block took fifteen minutes. Madine and Lennox seemed confused the entire way and Ahsoka couldn't help but feel as though this was not part of the plan the three of them had worked out in advance. Veers was still moving along and was still keenly focused. And they were all following along.

Two 501st Stormtroopers standing at the doors straightened and saluted as they approached and an awful feeling rumbled in the pit of Ahsoka's stomach as Madine gave his men some succinct orders and they quickly opened the door. Ahsoka had seen enough imperial torture chambers to recognize them from at a glance.

Within, the lighting was set far lower than the standard illumination outside in _Tyrant_'s main halls. The bulkheads and walls in the module were even painted a different color-where the rest of the ship was a standard, off-tone gray, this module was deep, jet black. In the corner, an assortment of interrogation droids, from the black, spherical IT-O to the track-wheeled, two-armed TO-D, sat, slumped over and inactive. Seated at a desk at the end of the room before the hallways to the prisoner cell blocks was an Intel Officer, who was intently studying surveillance screens of the prisoners.

The four officers approached the Major and he turned to salute the two Generals before giving a curious glance at the two newcomers who were not wearing standard Imperial uniforms.

"Major, this is Chief Mothma from Alliance High Command," General Madine said.

"We're honored by your presence, Your Excellency," he said with a sharp military bow. "I am Major Hulmpt Endaren."

"These are her aides, and Jedi Master Ahsoka Tano."

Ahsoka kept her distance and only nodded when the Major offered to shake hands. She had no desire to touch him at all.

"So, where's our priority prisoner?" Ahsoka asked.

"I take it you're referring to the former Admiral?" Endaren asked as he took his seat again and gestured to one of the surveillance screens. "That's him right there."

Ahsoka scowled as she looked at the grainy image of a wrinkled, balding middle-aged man. A black strip of torn cloth was tied around his head, covering his eyes. His cheeks and arms were swollen with bruises and his knees were constantly slumping with exhaustion, though it was impossible to sit down or rest because he was forced into a standing position by the long chains that had his wrists shackled up to bars hanging from the ceiling.

Aileen's expression twisted. "Gods, _what_ have you done to him?"

Endaren gave a confused shrug. "Not much. Captain Lennox gave him the customary thumping after arresting him and we've just been holding him ever since."

"But why is he..." She pointed to the chains shackling him to the ceiling.

"Enhanced interrogation procedure," Endaren explained quickly. "He's been up for about twenty-seven hours now. I'm probably going to keep him up another three then let him rest for two."

Aileen frowned deeply. "Is that really necessary?"

"We have to run him through a gauntlet of sleep dep before we start the actual interrogation."

"Which starts when?" She asked.

"After we wake him from his two hour nap," Endaren said. He opened a drawer and proudly gestured to the assortment of sharp and shiny implements contained within. "Then we'll start with the next phase: tools. And if he's still not willing to budge, we'll give him two more days of sleep dep then sic the droids on him."

Ahsoka made a mental fist pump when she turned and saw the horror on Mon Mothma's face. It would seem that the chief was finally getting an idea of just what kind of people they were dealing with. This sorry little display made a great case against bringing these defectors in. After all, Kendal Ozzel was their commanding officer a little more than two weeks ago: now, just look at what they'd done to him.

"No," Mothma said firmly, her eyes locked severely on Endaren as she shook her head. "We're not going to do that."

"Why not?" Endaren's tone was a surprised scoff.

Mothma just shook her head.

"Look," Endaren began, his tone slightly frustrated. "I'm sure we can interrogate him and get the information out of him one way or another but it would be much quicker-much _easier_-if we just stuck to the enhanced techniques."

General Madine's frown deepened before he said, "Chief, you don't have to get your hands dirty or even be the slightest bit involved in the process. I'm sure that Major Endaren can get us the information we need by sixteen hundred tomorrow. I think it would be best to let Major Endaren handle the interrogation. After all, he is the expert. He has been trained by Lord Vader-"

"_No_," the Chief said sharply. "We're not going to do _that_." She pointed emphatically to the screen, specifically to the binders that had Ozzel chained to the ceiling. "_That_, gentlemen, is precisely the sort of abuses we're trying to stop! Even someone like Ozzel deserves to be treated with some measure of dignity. He is a _sentient_."

When Endaren did nothing and looked helplessly to his CO, Ahsoka spoke up. "You heard Her Excellency, didn't you?"

General Madine craned his head slightly and hesitated. Ahsoka could sense the conflict within him; Madine's personal sense of honor bumped up against an unerring hatred he harbored for Ozzel. After a beat, the 501st General nodded to his subordinate and Major Endaren paced down the cell block with two 501st Stormtroopers. They watched the surveillance screen as Endaren undid the shackles and let Ozzel down to rest.

"We will take the prisoner now, General," Mon Mothma said, her tone still severe though somewhat milder than before. "Ahsoka, take him to our ship."

The lights in the chamber room suddenly cut out, replaced only by the crimson haze of red alert.

_"Enemy ships spotted! All hands on deck!"_

Ahsoka looked up at the claxons and sighed. "I think that's our cue to leave."


	17. Chapter 15

Leia awoke from another restless, nightmarish sleep. The abuse she had endured at Vader's hands was terrible, but that was not the memory of the Death Star that dominated her psyche. It was Tarkin. Tarkin and his much subtler form of torture, which he had used to inflict the deepest wounds possible.

That scene aboard the observation deck replayed every night in her sleep. And with every startled rise to consciousness, she could only flood her mind with regrets, with questions of how she could have handled things differently. How she could have saved her planet. If only she had given in to him. If only she had mentioned Dantooine...or Ansion...or...

She sat up in her bed, scrubbing her face as hard as she tried to scrub the feeling. Pooja had placed her in this room, on the third floor of the north spire. It faced east-southeast, towards the sandy shores on the other end of the lake, and the small valley where the sun first peaked out before making its rise across the sky.

This had once been her mother's bedroom. The dresser, a nine drawer mahogany wood piece, still carried some of her trinkets and knick-knacks. Leia had spent several minutes last night looking them over, admiring the elaborate jewelry of an elected Queen, all while wondering what she must have been like.

Leia looked through the dresser and the closet, trying to find a suitable outfit from her mother's wardrobe. She eventually settled upon a casual brown dress with a matching sweater. Then she washed her face in the affixed bathroom, trying to make the heavy bags under her eyes less noticeable.

Arlan and another twi'lek of similar age, were running up and down the hall when Leia emerged from her room. They laughed to each other before abruptly stopping and giving a smart nod of respect to the Princess.

"Miss Organa," Arlan said. He gestured to his companion. "This is my friend Navati. Master Pooja asked me to accompany you to the Sunroom, in case you didn't know..."

"Well." She smiled. "I don't. So, lead on, please."

Arlan and Navati led Leia down the hall to the large staircase that spiraled down and around the circumference of the spire. Plasteel windows gave them an unobstructed view of the lake, the mountains the side of the island that the villa was built into. Leia had woke later than she intended, but it was still early enough to see the morning fog and its prismatic distortions of the waxing sun.

Arlan and Navati eventually led her to a large room that sloped out of the side of the spire, a huge observation deck that overlooked a small cove just west and inland of the villa. Pooja Naberrie sat at the dining table set upon the balcony, dressed in simple brown robes, her hair knotted into braids.

Arlan and Navati both bowed to Pooja before dismissing themselves.

"Good morning," Pooja said. She gestured to one of the seats prepared at the table. "Please join me. Breakfast has been ready for some time."

Leia smiled appreciatively at the wonderfully apportioned preparation of fruits, vegetables and cheeses. She took her seat and started to serve herself. Pooja leaned back in her seat, sipping from her simple, yet elegant black tea cup.

"Are you alright?" Pooja suddenly asked as Leia was halfway through her meal. "You seem like you had a long night."

Leia met her gaze for a moment, the details of her recurring nightmare flashing through her mind as a horrific blur. "I..."

Her voice trailed off as she considered all that Pooja had said yesterday, the lengths to which her cousin had gone to lay bare everything about their family that she had never known. She considered the warmth and security she felt in Pooja's presence, the assurance that came from someone who genuinely cared...and still, still she was afraid. Because she had to carry the burden of being Alderaan's last daughter-and not even it's last daughter, but merely another world's orphan-and its ultimate betrayer.

_Betrayer_. The syllables wrung in her head.

"I...just had a hard time sleeping," Leia said. "With everything you said, I couldn't stop thinking about it. I...was up until three last night looking at my mother's things."

Pooja nodded slowly. Leia couldn't help but feel that her cousin was, at least on some level, unsatisfied with the incomplete answer. "Aunt Padmé had a lot of beautiful jewelry. Lots of gifts from foreign dignitaries. Royal houses all over the galaxy paid her tribute. But nothing she had was more beautiful than the piece they almost buried her with."

Leia set her fork down. "Which was...?"

"The Japor Snippet. I left it hanging from the stub over the mirror."

She nodded, remembering the trinket and its simple, handcrafted design. "I saw it, yeah."

"All the other pieces she had were given out of respect for her station or rank. That was truly a gift of love." Pooja gazed at the dining table centerpiece for a moment, lost in thought. "It was something your father made."

"And who was he?" Leia asked. "Some...prince? A nobleman, maybe?"

Pooja looked up from the table and towards the door as Zev walked in, damp hair still dripping. A cold breeze seemed to blow in with him as he radiated the frigid temperatures of the lake.

"It's three days past the solstice," Pooja said, shaking her head. "How can you manage that swim?"

"You mean, to the valley and back?" Zev shrugged as he took across from her grabbing a bunch of grapes from the fruit platter. "What can I say? I'm hot blooded."

Pooja smirked. "You should have gotten a pneumonia a long time ago."

"Pooja-" Leia suddenly stopped when the urgency of her tone pulled Zev's attention to her. She looked at her cousin, who was alternating her focus between the two. "_Who_ was my father?"

"Zev," Pooja began. She blinked several times then rubbed the bridge of her nose before looking up at him. "I don't know why Ahsoka never told you this...she has no reason _not_ to. But Leia is my cousin."

His consternation deepened as he combed several damp strands of hair away from his face. "But..." He looked at Leia.

"I was adopted," Leia said simply.

"Her birth mother was my Aunt Padmé," Pooja said. She looked to Leia. "And your father was Ahsoka's first mentor."

"What?!" Zev's jaw practically dropped. "You mean...Skywalker?"

Pooja nodded. Leia frowned, utterly confused. "What?"

Zev was still aghast. "_The_ Anakin Skywalker?"

Again, Pooja nodded.

He shook his head and looked at Leia, a sly, disbelieving smile falling upon his lips. "It all makes so much sense now."

"_Who_ was Anakin Skywalker?" Leia practically shouted the question at him.

"The greatest Jedi of the Old Republic-" Zev suddenly stopped, then scratched his temple as he continued to pull his thoughts together. He amended himself: "after Master Yoda, of course. But still. You don't remember Anakin Skywalker?"

"_No_." She was starting to get real annoyed with being out of the loop, with constantly being one step behind-

"The 'Hero with no Fear?' The battles of Christophsis and Ryloth? He saved the Republic from the Separatists so many times." Zev's tone and cadence seemed to increase with each syllable uttered, to the point where he started to sound like a six year-old gushing on about his favorite action holofilm character. "He was a legend, the reason I wanted to become a Jedi. They used to play his news clips all the time, at least until I was...six-"

"Well," Leia suddenly said. "I'm flattered, Zev, that you would forget that I'm actually six years younger than you."

He pressed his lips together as he sucked in an uncomfortable breath. Unwilling to concede the point, he continued, "Still, I can't believe Viceroy Organa never told you anything about him. They were good friends, at least Ahsoka said so."

Leia closed her eyes, feeling the rawest of her wounds ruffled once more. The lies-could they be called lies? No, qualitatively they were not lies, just withheld truths. And she had been raised in a reality based on that tenuous void.

She looked away from her friend Zev and her cousin Pooja, mind swimming upstream against her better judgment, exploring thoughts that were better off left unpondered. Why had they gone to the lengths of adopting a child from off-world? According to her cousin, the stormtroopers and the Empire had only come to Naboo a year after her birth. So why would they have taken a child from a family that was still relatively intact, still capable of taking care of its own? Were Bail and Breha so desperate to hide their inability to have children of their own? Were they fearful of the Organa dynasty tumbling like a house of cards?

Leia looked at her hands, at the fingertips that were slightly red from handling muja fruit. Were her actions-or even her very presence-here fulfilling her parents' greatest fears? She remembered what Ahsoka had said, about her lineage and her destiny. Now that she knew the truth, could she be thankful to Ahsoka and sorry for the rude response? Or was she to be even more cautious? After all, there had to be a reason why Bail and Breha would have obscured her origins.

Pooja's lips were pursed behind steepled fingers. Her dissatisfied gaze was pinned on Zev, whose uncomfortable expression had blossomed into outright embarrassment. Leia sighed. She didn't anyone to feel as though they had to walk on eggshells around her because her parents had passed recently. This sort of self-censorship was more annoying and insulting than anything else they could have said...

"So, then, what are we getting ourselves into today?" Leia asked. "Hopefully not another swim."

Pooja smiled. "No, even I'm not cruel enough to subject someone to that during winter." She rotated her tea cup without lifting it off the table. "I'm going to teach you some of the basics of fencing today."

"Fencing?"

"Yes, the basics, with a foil and dagger, then some more advanced techniques with a saber." Pooja stopped turning the cup and lifted it from the table. "Then, when you're ready, we'll see about getting you a lightsaber crystal."

Leia perked up at the mention of the Jedi weapon. Unlike all the other subtleties of the Jedi, the lightsaber was an item of unmistakable power. Her fascination with it had never failed to subside after seeing Ahsoka use it so masterfully on Ansion. This was one aspect of the training that she unequivocally looked forward to.


	18. Chapter 16

A/N: Sorry about the paragraph and editing issue. I won't be using copy + paste into the story box again. Chapter 15 should be finished now. Here's a bonus chapter!

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><p>There was a measure of peace that Zev found in Varykino that he could find no where else. This was a place of absolute security, a place whose borders could not be encroached upon by Vader, the Empire, his father or anyone else that would seek to violate his tenuous peace of mind.<p>

He sat atop the balustrade of the eastern porch, overlooking the lake as the waning winter sun began its descent toward the snow-capped peaks just beyond the valley on the mainland shore. Those final concentrated sunbeams dried the beads of sweat left on his brow by the days' exercises. He had led the younglings through a grueling gauntlet, not unlike the one he had constructed for Leia on Tashyma.

"Hey there," Pooja said as she emerged from the spire.

"Hi." He turned to her and smiled as she approached. "How did things go with Leia?"

"As far as fencing goes, she's a natural. Like her father." She crossed her arms over her chest, the rough hems of her Jedi robe folding over each other. "But she's a mess below the surface and she won't let it on. The destruction of Alderaan had a really destructive effect. I felt the scars in her psyche when we meditated."

Zev turned to the lake, watching beams of reflected sunlight in ripples on the surface. He looked back to her. "Think she's still having the nightmares?"

Pooja nodded solemnly.

"Did she at least acknowledge them? Or did she lie to you too?"

"I haven't brought it up yet," she said. "We should give her some time. Then she'll feel comfortable enough to talk about it."

He nodded. She was always more patient than he was.

"How was your day?" She asked.

"It was relaxing," he said. "The younglings and I had some fun."

She arched an eyebrow at him. "I heard. Navati said she had a wonderful time running and jumping and rolling and ducking...but the others aren't as athletic as she is."

Zev shrugged. "And whose fault is that, Madam Principal?"

She leaned forward, blue eyes skewering him with taunting glare. "Do you really want to make this into a personal matter, Inspector?"

"Maybe," he said. "Have you run the gauntlet yet?"

"No." She nodded out to the lake. "But I have swam to the far shore in less than twenty minutes."

Impressive. He flared an eyebrow at her. It was more than a thousand meters to the far shore, further than he'd swam in a long time. And at this time of year, it would be a real challenge.

"You're on," he said, rising to stand on the balustrade. He took off his shirt and she took off her robe, revealing that gorgeous body he had so thoroughly missed over the past few months. Her skin glistened as she stood up on the balustrade with him. She took a few moments to straighten her sport bra and fix her underwear.

"On three?" He asked.

"No." She pulled her hair back. "Lets just go...now!"

Then she jumped in, headfirst and Zev sighed at her slight head start before jumping in after her. The freezing water hit him like a shower of spikes, one which he shrugged off with powerful breaststrokes. By the midway point they were still even, but Zev was ready to pull ahead. That's when Pooja surged forward with a burst of speed he couldn't match.

By the time he reached the far shore, she was already lying on her back on the rocks, looking at Varykino in the distance.

"Cheater," he said, shaking his head.

"Oh." She pursed her lips. "Don't lose so gracelessly, now."

Zev chuckled and scratched the back of his neck. "Springs?"

"Yeah." She nodded. "It's been a long day."

He helped her to her feet and they walked up the shore, beyond the shrubs and treeline and over the slight incline that separated the lake from the valley beyond. They followed the trail beyond several forks before pacing off the path and into the woodland, towards Pooja's cave.

There were thousands of hot springs in the area, but this one had the distinction of being Pooja's closely guarded secret. As she had told him a year or so ago, she had discovered this cave when she was just a child on her family vacation and had kept it a secret from everyone-family, younglings and Jedi Master included. She felt so secure in her ownership of the cave and its exclusivity that she stripped off her remaining articles of clothing as soon as they crossed the threshold.

She tossed her underwear at him and he laughed. She hung her bra on a root that jutted out of the side of the cave then jumped into the bubbly warm mineral water. He took his shorts off and joined her moments later.

The warm fizzy mineral water washed over his body. He took in a deep breath and floated on his back, looking up in wonder at the smooth, rounded rock that must have been sculpted and formed over eons by glaciers. Pooja floated by and he instinctively reached out to her. She held his hand and he closed his eyes. There was not a moment in all existence he would trade for this.

Many minutes passed. He turned over and swam to the shallower segment of the pool and sat down, propping his back against a rocky outcropping. She followed and rested her head against his chest. They cuddled together for a long time, simply content to be together after months of separation.

"Do you remember when you first brought me here?" Zev suddenly asked.

A bashful, ear-to-ear smile formed on her face. "Yeah. It was the first rebellious thing I had ever done. Well, besides...you know."

He chuckled and shook his head. "I thought Obi-Wan was going to kill me. I mean, I was just some punk that Ahsoka had brought in and he had known me for all of what? Two days?"

"Remember the look on his face when we came back?" She asked.

A smile formed on his lips. "Yeah, he just stared at me, like I had deflowered his daughter or something..."

"Well...you did." She bopped him on the nose with her finger. "You bad, _bad_ person."

"I still can't believe we got off so easy for that..."

"Easy?" Pooja scoffed. "Obi-Wan had me changing the younglings' diapers for months. Hardly easy."

"Well, I thought for sure I was going to be expelled. That I had killed my chances at ever being a Jedi."

Pooja grasped his hand. "Obi-Wan never would have expelled you. Not after everything that happened between him and Siri, anyways..."

He shifted uncomfortably, and almost imperceptibly, at the name. She turned around and looked at him.

"She still hasn't told you, has she?" Pooja asked.

Zev shrugged. "Ahsoka doesn't exactly confide in people, as this whole incident with your cousin has proven." The disappointment in his voice was more palpable than he had intended for it to be. "Why don't you tell me about Siri?"

"She was a great warrior," Pooja said. "One of the few to hold their own against Vader alone. She was Ferus' mentor first, then Ahsoka's."

Zev nodded. All this, he already knew, but he let her go on.

"She and Obi-Wan were lovers," Pooja said.

Zev frowned at that. It was hard to picture Obi-Wan having a lover, or ever being romantically involved with anyone. He was a strict adherent to the code, despite his willingness to overlook his apprentice's choices.

"For a long time, too. Ferus once told me that they had been together, on and off, since they were teenagers."

His brows shot up at the revelation. "But they never had children?"

Pooja shook her head silently. Then she leaned back into the water, her eyes glazing over as she looked up at the bulges in the cavern ceiling. "I miss her a lot sometimes. Almost as much as I miss Obi-Wan. I learned so much from her."

"How did she die?"

"Years ago, after Ahsoka was knighted, she got into some trouble on Taris." Damp, brown tendrils of hair cascaded over Pooja's face as she looked away. "Siri intervened. They were ambushed by Vader. Siri died and Ahsoka escaped. I don't know anything else-only Ahsoka does."

Zev leaned back against the rock again, feeling a piece of his heart crushed by the revelation. Pooja swam back into his arms when she saw his dismay.

"Ahsoka," she began as she traced her fingers across his forearm, "has always been stuck in the past, unable to move on. She blames herself for Siri's death, and for lot of other things that happened long ago, when the Republic collapsed."

"I just wish she would trust me," Zev said. "I mean, I gave up everything to learn from her. I've been her loyal and dedicated apprentice for eight years. I thought that by now I would have earned access to some...privileged information like this."

"You have, Zev," she said. "It's just...Ahsoka. She doesn't trust anyone. She's always had issues with that."

He smiled as she looked up at him. He leaned in and kissed her as she propped herself up on his lap. "I'm so lucky to have you," he whispered.

"No, I am," she protested. "I think I would've packed it in a long time ago if you hadn't come around..."

He kissed her again.

"Zev..." Her hand trailed down his chest before falling to the water.

"What's wrong?"

"What's our future going to be like?"

He pursed his lips, as afraid of the question as he was of his lack of an answer. "I thought...I thought the future was for the future. We live now, don't we?"

"Yeah, and that's what we told ourselves when we were kids. Five years on, you really think we can keep playing this by ear?"

He frowned. "Do you want a commitment? A promise or something? You know I would never leave you-"

"It's not that-It's just..." she bit her lip before covering her mouth with the back of her hand. "What would you-what if I was pregnant?"

He blinked several times, mouth ajar as he considered the thought.

"Relax," she said with a grin. "I'm still on birth control. This is just...hypothetical."

"I-I don't know."

The steamy water sloshed about him as he leaned away then raised a hand to rub one of his temples. His mind's eye was overwhelmed with images of children, constructs and speculations as to what theirs would look like.

He said, "It's something I've never thought about before."

She frowned. "Really?"

"Well, with all my duties to the Alliance and Ahsoka sending me to train Leia...it's probably the furthest thing from my mind." He met her gaze, afraid of just where this conversation could go. "What about you? You must have thought about it a lot to bring it up..."

"Yeah." The word barely escaped her. "I'm getting older and I can't help but think about it-"

"Pooja," he deadpanned, "you're twenty-six."

"My mother was twenty-two when she had me."

He just scowled at her, unconvinced.

"Obi-Wan and Siri never had children because they waited too long. She miscarried twice." She sighed. "Zev, you want to have kids, don't you?"

"Yes," he said. His head was still swimming. "But...just not now. Not when everything's like this."

"Everything, as in...?"

"The Empire. Palpatine and his genocide against our people. The reason why we fight-because this galaxy isn't safe for our children."

"So you'd let that affect your plans? For now? For many years? Maybe forever?"

"No! Not forever, just..." His voice trailed off as he realized the flaw of his argument and the strength of her point. He wasn't afraid of the Empire and he wouldn't show it, not like this. He looked up at her again, another concern rising from his mind. "And our commitment to the Order? It's against the rules."

"We can change those rules."

"Then what about _our_ rules? Duty is supposed to come first, right? Isn't that what we agreed to before we even started seeing each other? I would have to quit the Alliance-"

She blinked. "You would do that?"

"Yes!" He said, astounded she would even question him on this. "I wouldn't want our kid to grow up without me. I can't-I _won't_-be like my father."

"Then stay here," she said.

"The Republic...the Alliance needs me."

"I know, but your first commitment is to the Jedi Order, to _our_ people. I can't keep teaching all these kids alone."

He looked away from her, confused at how inconsistent her request was with her character. She approached again, treading through the water gently, placing a hand on his face and slowly directing his attention back to her.

"I'm not rushing you," she said. "And I didn't mean to scare you with all this-"

"I'm not scared," he said quickly. "I just don't know how this can work."

"We'll figure it out," she said. "Because you're right. We still have a lot of time. I just wanted to make sure this was at least on your mind, that you knew this is what I want."

"It's what I want too." He cupped his hand over hers,then moved it slowly so he could kiss her palm. "I love you and I want to have a family with you, but... In a couple years, Arlan will be old enough to replace me, take my position in Alliance intel. Navati will be ready to leave, go on missions of her own. Then I can stay. And we can start planning."

"You promise?"

"I promise..." He smirked as she gravitated towards him.

"Really?" She stretched the syllables until they became a silly shriek. "And just what sort of..._consideration_ do I get out of that promise, inspector?"

"You're not challenging me, are you?" His eyes narrowed as he cupped back of her head with his hand and pulled her closer, their faces little more than centimeters apart. "That would be...foolish."

They kissed and he hoisted her up out of the water, laying her down on one of the large, smooth rocks adjacent to the pool. They made love for some time, before falling back into the pool to float in each other's arms.

By the time they returned to Varykino, it had been several hours since sunset. Arlan was watching the signal fire on the main balcony. He said nothing when they waved to him, simply flashed a knowing smile as they trudged up the stairs. They giggled to each other, their damp, under clothed bodies wrapped in plush cotton towels. Arlan grabbed another piece of wood, threw it into the flame and returned to his vigil.


	19. Chapter 17

Luke hoisted his catch aboard, nodding to his collaborator, the bounty hunter called Jerrasha, when she asked if they were good to leave. Luke shackled General Madryll Kulas to the bench as the loading ramp to Jerrasha's Sola-Scryb 654-13 freighter closed and the ship lifted off to make its flight back to Zendara-Ashla from Rodigean Plains, an entire hemisphere away.

He looked upon his victim and couldn't help but feel pity for him. Kulas was slumped over with a black bag over his head, unconscious from the cocktail of drugs Jerrasha had prepared. He would be delivered to one of the cruelest, most dangerous men in the galaxy before he woke, to be interrogated and perhaps executed.

And Luke had facilitated it. He spent a day roaming Zendera-Ashla and other neighboring cities and localities, before stumbling upon the local bounty hunters guild and the assortment of ladies and gentlemen there eager to take down imperial targets. After two days of being turned down due to his lack of currency, he discovered a picture and plaque in the trophy hall dedicated to none other than his roommate, Shira Brie.

When word spread that he was an associate of the infamous Brie, Jerrasha, who owed a debt to Brie, contacted him and agreed to work for free. Several days of planning and hours of execution later, they were here, ready to deliver the quarry to Lord Vader.

If everything went as Luke thought it would-as he knew it would-then he too would be responsible. He looked at his gloved hands, which he had used to beat and overpower the older man, then to administer Jerrasha's poisonous concoction. This was such a vile thing to do, something he already knew he would regret as thoroughly as his failure in the Death Star trench.

But was that feeling justified? Or was that simply his more civilized sensibilities, telling him what was appropriate, since he had not been raised or even trained to be a killer. Besides, Kulas was certainly not innocent. Every imperial officer had committed crimes against civilization in the course of their duty to the Empire; "following orders" was not a justifiable excuse, according to the Old Republic's laws on the matter.

Laws, which Luke had read and learned about in Vader's archive. Luke opened his autoreader. He'd downloaded thousands of files from that archive for evening reading. Vader said that the database of information was uncensored by the imperial politburo. Vader had told him that whatever he wanted to learn about his father, or about the real history of the Clone Wars, could be learned from there.

Yet there was an inconsistency. A clear gap of information, centering around one person in particular. He'd first discovered it a week ago, whilst reading an article on the battle of Christophsis and looking at the photographs and time lines.

Luke scrolled through the image galleries again, pausing at the recurring face that jumped out at him. An orange-skinned togruta, with a green lightsaber, who was, judging from her appearance, only in her teens. She stood beside his father in dozens of photos, not only of Christophsis, but of Teth and Geonosis and dozens of other battles. He kept scrolling through the pictures, trying to make sense of this recurring face, until he found the answer in a single caption:

_Anakin Skywalker, with his Padawan learner, Ahsoka Tano, after the destruction of the destruction of the Geonosian droid factory._

Padawan learner. Apprentice. But Vader had said that _he_ was Anakin's apprentice, right? Yes, apprentice as a Sith...but as a Jedi, too? Yes. Yes, he had said that. He had. Then who was Ahsoka Tano? Why hadn't Vader spoken of her? Was it possible that the archive was incorrect?

But Vader had presented them personally, said that they were complete and free of the Emperor's censorship. Luke swallowed as he opened a dialog box for a new search.

"_Zero matches for Ahsoka Tano. Did you mean_ Aayala Secura_?"_

He rubbed the heel of his palm against his lips, pushing them back into his teeth until he was nervously nibbling on them. The seeds of doubt had been stewing in his gut for days. Ahsoka Tano appeared in his dreams last night, after he fitfully fell asleep whilst considering this mission. The sheer simplicity of the lie made his gut churn. Then the doubts multiplied, as did the fear, as he found himself full of new questions...questions he could never ask Vader directly.

But did he even have to ask those questions? Luke had gone through search after search after search, trying to find any article that could possibly cross-reference Ahsoka Tano. He'd read up on Plo Koon and Barriss Offee and dozens of other Jedi that knew and served with her. The gap in the database radiated out like a stain on carpet. The excision was undeniable.

As he bit his palm, he recalled Vader's prior advice, about feelings being manipulated, turned against their owners. The basis of his doubt didn't come from questions about appropriate or inappropriate, justified or unjustified, but of fact and fiction. He had just done the bidding of a man that had lied to him, directly, unabashedly, for the purpose of manipulating his feelings, perhaps earning his trust and loyalty. Could he continue to follow this man?

Luke frowned as the craft jerked then began to slow. He looked out of his window, then ran to the other side of the cargo bay and gazed out the port window. Mount Zendera was no where to be seen.

"What's going on?" Luke asked through the comm.

"We got a mutual friend incoming," Jerrasha said, "Miss Brie said she would take you in from here."

Luke looked out the window again and an echo of fear bounced on his spine as he saw Shira's freighter zoom by, cargo hold open. He remembered Vader's explicit warning several days past and wondered if this whole thing had been a setup, if Jerrasha had been working with Shira all along.

"Catch you later, Skywalker," Jerrasha said as the loading door opened. "It was fun."

Shira stood on the other side of the bay door, arms crossed over her chest, red hair flapping in the breeze of upper altitude air the rushed between the two ships.

"So, where did you get the bright idea of invoking my name at the Bounty Hunter's guild?" She shouted over the ruffle of wind.

Luke pushed down all that Vader told him. He had no choice but to trust his feelings now...and his feelings told him that he was safe. Shira would not hurt him. She was a friend. He bent down and undid the bolt that secured Kulas's shackles to the bench and tossed him over to Shira's ship. As soon as he crossed over, Jerrasha's ship zoomed off.

"It worked, right?" He said to her as the bay doors began to close.

She shrugged. "Go and chain him to that cargo pile over there, would you?"

Then she walked out, leaving him to do the lifting alone. When he joined her in the cockpit, she was leaning back in her seat, feet up on the dashboard. She gestured to the co-pilot's seat, which was not nearly as comfortable as her corduroy lounger.

"What'd you just get in from?" He asked.

"Same as you," she said. "Though my missions never involve capture."

Oh. He looked at his hands again, this time imagining blood from the deed smeared all over them. She was a trained killer. How had she reacted the first time? Did she flinch or hesitate? Was there a spike of adrenaline? Did she ever feel guilt? Or remorse?

He looked at her, unable to verbalize the mass of questions that encircled and enslaved the core of his being. So he asked the one that his mind had anguished over for the past few days:

"Have you ever heard of a Jedi called Ahsoka Tano?"

Shira frowned at first, her gray-green eyes straying to the view screen as the ship's autopilot began to engage its course to Zendera-Ashla before refocusing on Luke.

"Yeah," she said with a nod. "I was actually tracking her for a while before master called me off. She's still out there and she's still very dangerous. A direct threat to us if we ever cross paths. Did you run into her? Was Kulas collaborating with her?"

"No." He paused, then scratched his head. "I just...read about her in the archive."

"Oh."

She fell further back into her seat, expression hardening with slight displeasure as though she had just disclosed something she was not supposed to. Luke bit his lip as he wondered if she too was in on Vader's lie, if she was his collaborator in this effort or if he had lied to her too.

"What was your life like before this?" Shira suddenly asked.

He looked up at her, yanked from his brooding. "Boring. I just lived with my Aunt and Uncle, that's all."

"That's it?" She frowned. "Come on, tell me more. What were they like? What did they do?"

"We were just farmers." Luke shrugged, unsure of what to say, as memories of his old routine escaped him that moment. He thought hard for a second, then it came rushing back. "I used to wake up several hours before dawn to adjust the moisture vaporators-Uncle Owen would give me hell if I adjusted any of them wrong-then I'd come in by midday, 'cause it's too hot to work outside and I would help Aunt Beru with all the chores."

"Chores?"

"Yeah, laundry, dishes, maintaining the garden." He stopped when he realized that she wasn't following at all. "You've never-"

"No." She turned from him and straightened in her chair, spine cracking in several places as she did.

"Lucky, then." He chuckled. "I can only imagine how great your home life must've been."

"No," she said, voice clipped, almost angry, as her gray-green eyes fixed on him. "You can't."

He practically froze in his seat as he met her gaze and felt her aura harden through the Force, condense down into a sharpened edge, a razor-bladed intent, channeled through eyes that only conveyed one thing in that moment: _danger_.

Then it passed, almost as quickly as it came. "Do you miss them?" She asked.

"Of course. They were my family."

He felt another roil of emotion from her, though this was blunter. Colder and unfocused, vented towards the galaxy at large. Luke wanted to know more, but knew that to ask would be to cross the line.

"We're here," she said, crossing her arms over her chest as she nodded to the image of the cliff side on the view screen. "Go on. Master wants to see you and the prisoner alone."

He walked out of the cockpit, glad to escape her presence. Kulas was awake by the time he walked into the cargo bay.

"Who's that?" Kulas asked, head turning to Luke's general direction. The chains that fastened him to the cargo contained clanked as he tried to turn his body around. "I demand to know who you are and why you have kidnapped me."

"I've brought you here so that you can face my master," Luke said as he pulled the key from his pocket. "There's no sense in resisting."

"And who...who is that?"

Luke looked at the man's head, still covered and bound with that amorphous black sack, as he released the chain that secured his bindings to the cargo container. "Vader."

"Vader?" Beneath the bag, Kulas shook his head. "But Vader's dead."

Luke said nothing, he just hoisted Kulas up and pushed him out of the freighter.

"You're joking, right?" Kulas's voice was wavering with fear now, twisting and catching in his throat. "Please, let me go."

"That's between you and my master."

"I have a family," Kulas said as he stumbled along the platform. "People that depend on me."

Luke shook his head. He didn't want this. He didn't want anything to do with this, but still he pushed the man along, and triggered the console switch when he came to it, causing the large stone slab doors to inch apart.

"Where are we?" Kulas asked.

"We haven't left Baraxis, if that's what you're asking," Luke said.

Echoes of their heavy footfalls filled the hallway as Luke pushed the general on. Kulas's body suddenly tensed as the feint sound of Vader's respirator became audible.

"Welcome, General," Vader's drumming bass tone beckoned like oblivion's call. "You may remove the blindfold, apprentice."

They crossed into the training room, where Vader stood, arms impatiently crossed over his chest. The obsidian mask was pointed directly at the man's bagged head, those darkened lenses focusing with a sharpened intent that Luke could fathom through the Force. Kulas recoiled instantly from the lights that hung in the room as Luke ripped the black bag off his head.

"L-lord Vader," Kulas stammered as he came face-to-face with the Sith Lord. "I-I...I thought you were dead."

"Yes," Vader said, "reports of my demise were greatly exaggerated."

"My lord," he said with a bow.

Luke looked the man up and down. His fear was palpable, infectious even.

"Why...why have you brought me here?" Kulas asked.

Vader towered over the man, an obsidian monolith of dark power. "I want to know, General, for how long have you been a spy for the Emperor?"

Kulas frowned, the uncertainty as clear in his face as it was in his demeanor. "My lord, I... do not understand what you mean. I simply do my duty, as the Emperor prescribes."

"Even if that means informing on your superior officers?"

Kulas' eyes glassed with unmistakable fear. He shook his head. "Grand Moff Raynor-"

He stopped abruptly as Vader began to pace towards him. Many silent moments passed and Luke felt an anxiety lurch up from his stomach. Eerie murmurs and fluctuations in the Force pushed Luke to face what he had silently feared since he pledged himself to the dark all those weeks ago on Yavin 5.

"Grand Moff Raynor works for me," Vader said, circling Kulas. "As such, he has my protection. Your attempts to have him removed by informing on him to the Emperor have displeased me greatly."

Luke stared off into the distance, mind lost in this moment and all its subtleties. Vader's intent was a serrated edge: vicious, cutthroat and visceral. He had no delusions about what would happen next. And he was responsible. He had conspired to create this moment of madness. He should have stopped this, resisted when he could have, should have refused, should have... he looked up, then practically jumped out of his skin when he realized that Vader was staring straight at him.

"Kill him," Vader ordered.

The words washed over him like a toxic tide. There was no malice in the words, no intonation to indicate its diabolic nature. Voiced as though it were a request as casual as a shopping list, not an order to exterminate a sentient. He looked at his hands, still gloved in black leather, then to his weapon. Could he do this? Here and now?

"No-I didn't know," Kulas said. "Please, Lord Vader, I did not mean to offend you-"

The General literally choked on his words as Vader raised his hand, fist open and palm out to him. "With respect," Vader said, not a hint of sarcasm in his monotone bass voice, "I was not speaking to you, General."

Luke looked at his victim, every ounce of his being appalled at the task set before him, and at the liar that had set him to the task. He'd killed before. Between the escape on Han Solo's ship and the assault on the Death Star trench, he must have shot down a dozen TIEs. But that was in the heat of battle, with every one of his instincts firing on for survival.

His blood was cold now, frozen in the impossibility of this moment. It was absurd. Disgusting, even. Kulas wasn't even armed.

"No," he whispered. "It's not _right_."

Vader nodded, neither offended nor amused by the refusal, his reaction determinedly neutral as he folded his arms over his chest once more and began to pace around Kulas again.

"So, then," Vader began. "That is what you believe? Right and wrong?"

Luke thought back to the earliest things Uncle Owen had taught him, the fundamentals of common decency that had fallen by the wayside as the barbarity of the Empire overtook the Republic.

"You cannot burden yourself with that sort of primitive thinking," Vader said. "That is for the governed classes of society. Not for us."

"You already have him in custody-" Luke swallowed, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Why do this? He doesn't deserve-"

"Deserve has nothing to do with it," Vader said. "Think of costs. Think of benefits. It is a far more efficient basis for making decisions. How much would it cost to keep General Kulas alive? And what of the permanent strategic disadvantage of having an enemy at your back? A traitor in your midst? Think logically."

Luke shook his head. "This is someone's life."

"It is." Vader made a dismissive gesture. "You think your father never had to make these sort of difficult decisions? It is what separated him from the rest of the self-righteous Jedi. He saw beyond the limitations of their thinking"

Luke breathed heavily. "That...can't be right," he said.

"If you choose to see things that way, then..." Vader shook his head before he turned back to Kulas. "Tell me, General, how many innocents did you murder when you ordered the Base Delta Zero of Teysan? Or the invasion of the Kul'darath townships? How many children do you think died?"

He sucked in a huge breath as the clamps on his vocal chords were suddenly released. "No," he gasped. "I was just...following orders."

"Following orders?" Vader's bass voice assumed a mocking tone. "You were not forced or coerced. You had every right-every opportunity-to disavow your orders or resign your command. You were not a slave or a thrall, a chink securely fastened in the chain, with no possible means of escape. You were never in my position. So what absurd sort of excuse is that?"

Kulas blanched as Vader leaned towards him, the black mask just within striking distance. Every word, every possible rebuttal, escaped him in that moment as he just shuddered in his place.

"Did you think I would have you execute an innocent man?" Vader asked as he turned back to Luke. "But that is neither here nor there. This is beyond right and wrong. _You_ are beyond right and wrong. If you retain one thing from this lesson, please retain this. You will be weak, limited and ineffectual if you choose to _moralize_ your actions."

The pressure on Luke's shoulders soon matched the anxiety rising from his gut. His frown deepened as he considered his predicament. Distant memories of Tatooine and of the simple, law-abiding life he lived there echoed in his heart as he wished with every sinew of his body that he could go back.

"I tire of this impasse," Vader said. "So I will tell you one last time: execute this traitor."

Luke's hand went to his weapon. He knew better than to deny a man as powerful-and as dangerous-as his master. There was no escape from this moment, or the heinousness of its essence. After he depressed the trigger of his father's weapon and did the deed, he knew that there would be no release from its unholy grip.

Not here. And not so long as he remained Vader's apprentice.


	20. Chapter 18

"There's a lot of fighters out there," Mon Mothma said, staring a scan on the main console. They had, just moments ago, boarded the ship with Kendall Ozzel in tow.

"Think I don't know that, Chief?" Han blurted between setting the nav computer and powering up the weapons systems.

Chewie grumbled something under his breath and Mon Mothma leaned in. "What's he saying?"

"Telemetry scan is counting six enemy capital ships," Ahsoka said, "three Venator-Class Star Destroyers, one Imperial, and two lancer frigates."

"Sounds like you're got your work cut out for you, Captain." Mon Mothma's tone sounded distinctly like a challenge, and Han seemed to respond to it as such.

"Start calculating for the jump to lightspeed as soon as we're clear of the landing bay," Han said. "Take over, Chewie. Ahsoka! Care to join me on the cannons?"

She just smiled at him, then ran off after him down the main corridor.

"I'll take top!" Han yelled as he jumped into the access tube.

Ahsoka grumbled. "Why am I always stuck on bottom?"

Moments later, they were clear of _Tyrant_'s hangar bay and right in the thick of a frantic dogfight that reminded Ahsoka of the Clone Wars. She had to shield her eyes several times as flashes of tubrbolasers, blaster bolts and exploding concussion missiles lit up her field of vision.

Ahsoka and Han did their best to clear the way for Chewie to pilot them out of the fray, but their YT-1300 freighter was a pretty conspicuous target in this sea of TIEs. And TIEs were _everywhere_. They seemed to be flying in from all directions, ducking and diving, evading tails and chasing other TIEs off their friendly bomber squadrons.

"Kriffin' hell, there's so many of them!" Han yelled.

"Tell me about it!" Ahsoka shouted back up the tube. "And the friendlies keep flying in the way, stepping on my shot!"

She heard Han sigh through the comm. "Kind of hard to think of an eyeball as a friendly, don't you think?"

Ahsoka shrugged, then depressed the trigger and turned an oncoming TIE into space dust. She swiveled hard, banking left and up to look for new targets. Beyond their snub fighter dogfight, the capital ships were bombarding each other in the distance. One of the Lancer cruisers was already coming apart at the seams. _Devastator_ and _Avenger_ were broadsiding one of the enemy Venators, at point-blank range. The enemy ship was sustaining significant damage; debris was floating free from hull breaches on multiple decks, leaving exposed superstructures and surface fires.

The Falcon rattled hard as Chewie growled over the comm.

Hey, you two better start picking up the slack, we're taking beating and the navicomputer's still got another forty-five seconds to complete the calculations.

"Hey, why don't you keep focused on flyin' the ship, pal!" Han yelled. "Let us handle the fighters."

Just letting you know that our deflectors are running low.

Moments later, the ship shook so hard that Ahsoka fell out of her seat and a coolant pipe overhead burst open, spewing high-pressure gas everywhere. Ahsoka grunted and hit her head on the bottom of her seat a couple times trying to reach over and turn the manual shut off manually shut off on the pipe.

"Kriffing hell, Chewie, I thought you said deflectors were low!" Ahsoka said as soon as she put her her headset back on. "That felt like something got through!"

Dorsal deflectors _are_ down now! It's hard to see from the cockpit, but there's a couple of TIE bombers right on top of us, hitting us with detonators.

"You heard him, Han?" Ahsoka asked. "Han? Han, are you on that?"

Ahsoka swiveled about and looked up to the top end of the tube. Han was sprawled back in his chair, face bloody, five pieces of shrapnel, each middling in size between her thumb and index finger, stuck in his left chest.

"Han!" Ahsoka jumped out of her chair and started racing up the ladder to the dorsal cannon.

It's all good, we're clear!

Ahsoka had to brace herself hard against the ladder as the Falcon jumped to hyperspace. When she looked up, Han had tumbled free of his station and was falling down the tube. She reached out with the Force and caught him, then gently lowered him into the main corridor. She climbed out next to him and was mortified by how bad the wounds were. His arm had been badly burned from what must have been a console fire. His face was so bloody it was difficult to trace the bloodshed to their original wounds. His chest was rising steadily but his pulse was weak. If she didn't move soon...

"Chewie!" Ahsoka yelled. She hadn't seen an injury like this since the Clone Wars. "Chewie!"

Aileen was the first person to come running down the corridor. She had the look of someone that had never seen compound wounds like this before.

"The hell are you doing?" Ahsoka screamed. The aide jerked back at the reprimand, a fine sheen of sweat forming on her face. "Don't just stand there, get a kriffing med kit!"

Aileen Tahn was still standing aside in a useless panic when Chewie came running in with a med kit.

What happened? He growled.

Ahsoka looked up at him. "You said there were bombers over us, remember? Well he was on the dorsal turret."

Chewie looked down and saw the severity of Han's wounds. Can you help him?

Ahsoka swallowed hard, her face further dampening with sweat. Healing was not one of her specialties, but she had learned a thing or two about field surgery in the war and she was already using the Force to slow the blood flowing from his wounds. She turned from Chewie to the mortified aide.

"Aileen, do you know how to stitch?" Ahsoka asked.

"I-uh"

"Okay, well now's your chance to learn. Great life skill to have, I promise you." Ahsoka beckoned for her then Chewie grabbed her by the hand and practically dragged her down to Han's side.

Han's eyes fluttered open a couple of times and he groaned: a deep guttural sound that was filled with more pain than Ahsoka could imagine. "Ahsoka?" He asked. "What...what-"

"Shh," she said, gently stroking the side of his face that wasn't covered in blood. "Han listen to me and try to stay calm, alright? We were hit and you were at the center of it. Concussion missile or Thermal detonator, it's too hard to tell yet-"

"What'd those bastards do to my ship?"

Ahsoka couldn't help but smile. "Don't worry about that right now, Han. Just...breathe, alright?"

"I think I'm...dying-"

"_No_!" Ahsoka closed her eyes and wiped the sweat and the panic from her forehead. She stroked his head gently, orange fingers running through his brown hair, soaked by a mixture of blood and sweat. "Han, I know you're in pain, but you can't-you can't give in. Just breathe, alright? Just breathe and focus on the sound of my voice."

He looked up at her forlornly, then swallowed hard and nodded.

"You're calm. You're in the safest place you can be-on your ship, with friends all around you." She touched his forehead with two fingers and channeled the suggestion into his mind. "All the pain you're feeling, all of the panic, all of the stress-it's being condensed into a tiny ball and jettisoned out of waste tube with the rest of the garbage. You're at peace."

Then he was out in a trance and his vitals fell into a stable pattern-a pattern that would only remain stable for a little while longer if they didn't get to work immediately. Ahsoka looked back at her makeshift medical team and saw that they were ready: Chewie had already prepped the bacta bandages and anti-septics. Aileen had threaded the needle with a surgical suture-though her hands were still shaking at the thought of actually having to use them.

"Okay." Ahsoka took a moment to calm herself. She wasn't going to lose another friend like this. Not today. "I'm going to use the Force to put pressure on the wounds and stop the blood flow. Chewie, I want to you to gently remove each piece of shrapnel while Aileen cleans the wound then stitches it up."

"No, no, I can't-" She shook her head. "Mister Chewbacca, you _have_ to be able to do this. I can't-"

Chewie glared at the needle, then showed her both of his palms. Look at the size of my hands. Do _you_ think I can stitch with that needle?

Aileen clearly did not understand Shyriiwook, because she kept looking at him expectantly while presenting the needle and sutures.

"Listen to me," Ahsoka growled. "Applying stitches isn't exactly hyperspace science. You'll be fine, councillor. Just focus on cleaning each wound and sewing it up, alright?"

Aileen nodded and put her head down and got to work as Chewie removed each piece of shrapnel. Ahsoka strained through the whole process, hand and mind tiring from holding back all of the blood that wanted to spurt out of Han's gaping wounds. The jagged, uneven stitches that Aileen sewed in were hardly perfect, but they worked well enough to keep the blood from flowing out.

By the time they finished, Ahsoka was exhausted. She took a huge breath of relief then leaned back against the bulkhead, one hand resting on Han's forehead, the other wiping her face of sweat.

"You love him, don't you?" Aileen asked as she cut the final stitch.

Ahsoka met the aide's gaze. If she had any semblance of composure left-if she wasn't so drained, mentally, physically and emotionally from performing this procedure-then, maybe she would have shook her head. Denied it, as she always did, to Chewie, to Zev, to Han, to herself...

But she just turned away, looked down at Han and ran her fingers through his hair.

"My god..." Aileen whispered, astonished. "You do."

It was too late to protect herself from it now. Ahsoka just swallowed glumly and looked up at Mon Mothma's aide, the expression on her face distant and uncaring.

Aileen's astonishment quickly gave way to disdain as she backed away and shook her head. "You're even more pathetic than I first thought."

She dropped the needle holder and the spindle of thread into the med kit and walked away. Ahsoka craned her head after her, and saw Mon Mothma standing just two and a half meters down the corridor. The displeasure on the Chief's face told her everything. Whatever credibility she had remaining with High Command had just gone down the tubes.

They waited until after she and Chewie had put Han to bed in his cabin before calling her in for a talk. There were endless whispers as she walked into the main hold, most of them coming from Aileen Tahn. The two other aides crowded around her and she stood directly behind the Chief, whose arms were crossed over her chest.

"It would seem that we've discovered the true nature of your relationship with Captain Solo," Mon Mothma said, her voice mostly even and reserved. Her face looked was a floodgate, ready to unleash a wash of judgment.

"I don't know what you think you saw-"

"Is Han Solo your lover?" Aileen Tahn asked from behind Mon Mothma's shoulder.

Ahsoka's face turned to stone. "So, this review has now become an inquisition into my personal life?"

"Hardly, Master Tano," Tahn said, steepling her fingers.

"Your paramours are your own business," Mon Mothma said.

"Jedi don't have paramours," Ahsoka said, looking away. "Whatever you think you know, you're mistaken."

"And I'm supposed to take your word for it?" The Chief shook her head. "I think I've been clear in the past, but I'll say it again: I don't trust you, Ahsoka. You've never given me a reason to. And after seeing the way that you and your..._friends_ operate, I have even more reservations."

"If you are involved in a romantic relationship with Captain Solo, then the constant payments you have made to him out of the Alliance general fund constitutes a conflict of interest of the highest order," Aileen said.

Ahsoka clenched her jaw. "I'm not sure if you've noticed-but there's a pretty large 'if' in your logic, Miss Tahn."

"An 'if' that seems to shrink once your sub-par record and lack of credibility is factored in."

"We do wonder," the aide to Aileen's left began, "exactly what sort of services you contracted Captain Solo for."

The Jedi Master sighed. She was tired, too tired to play this back-and-forth game with Mon Mothma's aides or even be offended by their flitting, veiled insults. As she looked at the floor and cracked her knuckles pensively, she wondered what Anakin would think of this predicament. Or what Siri would, for that matter. It would seem that her roots into the Alliance were damaged irreparably. Perhaps it was time to move on.

"You will leave this ship as soon as we're docked aboard _Home One_." Ahsoka said, eyes directly on Mon Mothma. "You can close my expense accounts. Consider this my resignation."

Zev was seated on the roof of Varykino's spires, meditating and enjoying the winter sun when a holo-transmission came through on his comlink.

"Master?"

"_I've got a bit of bad news, Zev,"_ Ahsoka said.

"Complications with the meeting between my Father and Mon Mothma?"

"_Mon Mothma's decided to bring him in and push me out."_

Zev blinked. Try as he did to release his anger to the Force, his emotions surrounding his father always seemed to get the better of him. And this...this whole matter with Mon Mothma made _everything_ worse. The Alliance. The Corellian treaty...

"Does she realize that she's going to destroy everything in the process?"

Ahsoka shook her head. _"She thinks that Veers is sincere, and that if she makes them confess to their crimes _before_ pardoning them and taking them in that she can somehow control them."_

"It's a fool's errand." He clenched his fist. "You had to have told her that she was making a massive mistake-"

"_She won't listen to me. She doesn't trust me. She-"_ Ahsoka stopped, then shook her head and laughed. _"You know what she accused me of? She and her aides accused me of having an affair with Han Solo."_

"You're not, are you?"

She glared. Zev smirked awkwardly and tried to shrug it off as a sour joke. He knew his master had a unique relationship with that particular Corellian and exactly where she drew the line was one of the many secrets she always seemed to keep from him.

"_She accused me of having a conflict of interest."_

Zev pursed his lips and nodded slowly. He could already see where this was going. "So she expelled you?"

"_I resigned before she had the pleasure of calling a formal inquiry."_ The anger in Ahsoka's voice gave way to fear. _"I think Vader is still alive, and I think he has manipulated events to turn out this way."_

"Makes sense. He gets men loyal to him into the heart of the Rebellion, just a few steps short of taking over the entire thing."

"_But where is he hiding?"_ Ahsoka sighed. _"And Luke's been missing..."_

Zev frowned. "Who?"

The look on Ahsoka's face said enough. Either he wasn't supposed to hear that or she wasn't supposed to say it that loud. Zev just shrugged then looked away while biting his lip.

"Master, exactly how am I supposed to help you when you _never_ tell me everything that's going on?"

"_It's...personal. Things I've never told anyone."_

_Yeah, things you can't trust me with…_Zev felt a numbness in his chest as the silence stretched on. It was an old hurt, one he'd long ago learnt to live with long ago. There were many barriers that his master would never lower, no matter how much they'd been through together. That was just Ahsoka's nature.

"Pooja wants to have a baby," he said.

"_What?"_

"She told me, the other day. She wants me to stay on Naboo on a more permanent basis and help her train the younglings. And she wants us to have one of our own."

Ahsoka was still astonished. _"I...don't even know how that would work."_

Zev smirked. "It must've been a long time ago, but I'm sure they taught you biology when you were a youngling."

She gave him an unamused smile. _"I meant in the context of our Order. It's been a very long time since Jedi were allowed to have families of their own, you know."_

He nodded. "Obi-Wan and Siri tried to have children, didn't they? After everything that's happened since the fall of the Republic...I get the feeling that we're all sort of making it up as we're going along anyways."

Ahsoka smiled bashfully. _"Zev, you know that you don't have to ask my permission-not that I would deny you if you were. I just...I guess I want to know how you feel about it. Do you want to have children?"_

"I'm afraid." He took several uneasy breaths. "So afraid that sometimes I can't sleep. I stay up and meditate to clear my mind. The galaxy, the Empire, that Death Star...everything's such a mess, and this is the universe that Pooja and I will be bringing a child into? A child that will probably be Force-Sensitive and therefore be hunted from the day of it's birth? Then we'll have to train him or her as a Jedi, so I can expect that after their thirteenth name day, they'll be a Padawan, and be out there, in constant danger..." He sighed again and trying to relieve the weight he felt on his chest. "And how will I ever learn to deal with that? Much less raise this kid to be a decent person?"

She was still smiling, in that warm, reassuring way she did. _"I don't know, Zev. But what I do know is that if there's anyone who can to those challenges, it's you. You'd be a great father."_

He smiled. "What about you, Master? What have you been struggling with?"

"_This thing with Han..."_ She covered her face with both her hands and Zev felt her struggling for words.

"You know you can trust me, right, Master?"

She nodded slowly. _"We were in a dogfight. On the Falcon. I was bottom gun, he was top. Deflectors went out for an instant before we hypered out and top was hit with a thermal. He was wounded so badly. There was so much blood I thought we were going to lose him for a while."_ She put her hand over her chest._ "And I started to panic."_

"And that's when they kicked in?" He raised a brow. "Your feelings?"

She looked at him thoughtfully. _"I don't__...__fully understand how I feel. I just know that I've seen these things turn out badly. Anakin and Senator Amidala. Obi-Wan and Siri."_

"Pooja and I are still doing fine."

"_A__ren't you afraid of losing her?"_

Zev frowned. "Yes, I guess, but not anymore than I fear losing you." He stroked his chin and looked off into the distance. The sun was starting to set. "That's the way of the Force, though. That's what you taught me, at least."

"_Yeah, I did. And that's why I can't let this happen. I can't-"_ She stopped herself and looked away and he saw a hurt in her eyes that cut deeper than _anything_ he could have possibly understood. She was remembering something, something from before their time together, something he couldn't have possibly known or understood. _"I used to have a friend named Rex. Did I ever tell you about him, Zev?"_

"No. No, Master, you didn't."

"_He was__...__a really good friend. Until the day he wasn't."_

He sat there, waiting expectantly for her to say more. She didn't. "Master?"

She blinked once then looked back up at him. Just like that, the flash of vulnerability, the signs of an imminent breakdown melted back into her usual expression and she folded her hands over her chest. _"I have to talk to Garm, figure out exactly what his game plan is going to be now that Mon Mothma has committed to this folly."_

Zev nodded, only slightly disappointed by the sudden return to business. "Should I declare for the new Corellian Resistance too, then?"

"_No. Mon Mothma likes you. She may not listen to you, but she likes you. Stay with the remains of the Alliance for now-we'll need eyes inside to keep track of what sorts of misplays she's making."_

"Okay. Are you going to come back to Naboo any time soon?"

"_Doubtful. There are other things I need to look into."_

"...Luke?"

Ahsoka shrugged. _"Yeah. We'll speak again soon, Padawan."_


End file.
